Retrofit of 1968 cavity wall house, F-rated EPC, to near as possible passivhaus standards, insulation and airtightness measures, triple glazing utilising south facing solar gain, MVHR, ASHP and underfloor heating. Watch this space!
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Upstairs nearly completed.
Still to do: cladding on the cheeks of the dormer, fascia and guttering, upstairs windowsills, patio, flooring downstairs.
It’s always rewarding to look back on the progress made—every stage of a build tells part of the story. At peterniven, we pride ourselves on transparent communication and steady progress throughout every project, ensuring our clients across the Mornington Peninsula stay informed and confident from concept to completion.
Now that the upstairs we liveable, it was time to start on the downstairs. First we had to remove the remaining screed from the back of the house. Then lay insulation. We put 125mm of insulation in the front rooms to bring it to roughly the same height as the back. Next we had to put down a later of polythene and a foam expansion strip around the outside to allow for the screed to expand when heated by the underfloor pipes. Then we lay the 16mm Thermrite (pex-al-pex) underfloor heating pipes and clipped down onto the insulation. We had 7 zones in total. The one big mistake we made was not too pressurise the system. We were told we only needed to fill the pipes with water. This is not correct, its important to pressurise the system up to about 6 bar and then let it drop and sit at 1.5 bar, otherwise the screed will crack. Because we didn't do this we had to cancel the screed delivery and go back into the queue. It meant that we had to move out for a month as we couldn't live in ...
Steve from the Green Building Store came along to commission our MVHR system. He said it all looked good and he was happy with the installation we had carried out. Using a anemometer he measured the flow of air from each value and balanced it accordingly. He then talked us through the settings on the MVHR machine (video above). It was important not to set the automatic bypass temperature too low as we could have a situation where the heat is being lost via the summer bypass at the same time as the underfloor heating is on. The bypass temperature is an average over the whole house. We have the underfloor heating thermostats set at 21 degrees C, and the bypass temp at 23 degrees C. We will see how it goes. The bypass doesnt stop until the temperature goes down a whole degree otherwise you would have it opening and closing constantly. The air in the house feels to fresh. We are hopeful that the fresh, filtered air will make life easier for our family members who suffer with asthma. ...
It’s always rewarding to look back on the progress made—every stage of a build tells part of the story. At peterniven, we pride ourselves on transparent communication and steady progress throughout every project, ensuring our clients across the Mornington Peninsula stay informed and confident from concept to completion.
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