Options for loft insulation?

[brightspark]

Explain please . It's in the roof void of my sisters house and my SIL's bungalow ..has been for 40 or so years . It appeared OK last time I checked them some 12 yrs ago ..loads of tiny spider webs across the chip holding every thing in place.

working in attics its a pig cutting holes in the ceiling for down lighters or if its in lath and plaser walls cuitting in sockets its all over the place plus the old stuff can have asbestos in it

 

[Wedg1e]

My dad has his roof undersides sprayed with that foam stuff, which presented some issues when the house was sold.

My mother recently had some high-pressure salesman (think 1980s double glazing type with a Porsche 924) trying to flog her spray-on insulation for her '37 3-bed semi.
Started at £13K, after a quick 'phone call to the boss' and some 'special OAP discounts' he magically got it down to £3K
The guy even climbed in the loft for a look (off a stepladder that was too short for the pre-war ceiling height ), when he got out he was red-faced and sweating like a Welshman with LLDDYUI on a triple-word score in Scrabble; mam asked him if he was OK and he said he suffers from claustrophobia.

There's already over 200mm of laid insulation so it's doubtful what the foam would do (besides make a mess)

 

[gaz1]

@DAPPH i appreciate the concern here, and thank you for your input. The roof isn’t in bad nick to look at it in the flesh, no damp, no leaks, no rot that can be seen, although I’ll have to have another look now you’ve pointed out some areas of concern…

Chimney breast hasn’t changed or deteriorated noticeably since we moved in, which was close to 10 years ago. Photo below which I took when we moved in to keep tabs on the brickwork and other than the few extra bricks with deposits (which again probably needs further investigation) it’s broadly unchanged.

View attachment 432014

It’s worth saying the whole house wants re-pointing, so that’ll need doing at some point but we aren’t planning on staying here too much longer so I certainly don’t want to be replacing a roof if I can avoid it. Although it would be a good opportunity to put an additional bedroom in the loft…

to be honest it looks like you have a leak down the middle of the chimney

as with the comment above

take your crap out and just insulate it
if your moving anyway dont bother with the other insulation just buy rolls and fit that on top of what you have alreeady

 

[Kerelise]

Same house as yours pretty much! I put a load of glass fibre then boarded the floor. On the rafters I just got a roll of kingspan Protect TF200 membrane and stapled in place with stainless staples. Then used that adhesive aluminium tape for the joins - it stops the crap falling down from the tiles beautifully.

 

[DAPPH]

working in attics its a pig cutting holes in the ceiling for down lighters or if its in lath and plaser walls cuitting in sockets its all over the place plus the old stuff can have asbestos in it

Mr Nearly ( as we called him ) the PO of our bungalow put in 10 recessed light ..they looked lovely the first night we moved in I could smell burning . The smoke alarm went off a few hours later I found the source of the smell . He 'd only gone and hole sawed through several trusses and fitted 50 watt recessed halogen lamps which had charred the wood.
In all cases he'd not put a wire tent aver the lamps in the roof void nor used silicone sleeving to stop the insulation cooking dripping off and becoming a short . Took them all out the next day ..packing boxes every where ... made new plaster board discs to fit the holes and set them screwed on thin laths in the roof void . Wend shopping of light fittings with GU10 lamp holders . Almost £1000 later we had the new lighting set up
As apart of the heat energy conservation exercise we've done , all of our lighting is either on the walls or inside the room as multiple angled spot lights off ceiling mounted led light arrays . .not a light pendant in the place

 

[DAPPH]

working in attics its a pig cutting holes in the ceiling for down lighters or if its in lath and plaser walls cuitting in sockets its all over the place plus the old stuff can have asbestos in it

You'll have years of dead birds , bats & insecits etc. rotting away to microfine dust along with feathers fur , nesting materials , maggot husks and bird poop . It's not very good on the lungs that's for sure