Cycling UK Forum

Biospace wrote: ↑12 Feb 2023, 6:42pmAs insulation levels edge to Passive House standards, heat sources grow milder until at the extreme, it's the fridge, laptop and your own body which provide all the necessary heat!

I think we're already reached that point. My mental arithmetic calculates that two adults living in a small mid-terrace flat, or house, built to the revised 2022 building regs would not require a heating system if built in some locations in the south of England. This assumes there would be some heat from a fridge, freezer, electric cooker, TV, computer, washing machine (and probably a lot more appliances).

In fact, I think it is only a matter of time before this thread becomes obsolete, because a member honestly reports that their home does not have a wood burner/GCH/storage heater/Aga/heat pump or any other form of heating.

Nearholmer wrote: ↑10 Feb 2023, 7:37pm Thinking only of storage heaters, the real way to make them not waste so much energy is to insulate them better, so that the user can draw heat from them when it is needed needed, not have it leaking out all over the place when it isn’t.

But they don't waste energy. Under the law of conservation of energy, energy can be converted into other forms of energy but cannot be lost. As my storage heaters are silent, and don't emit light, any 'waste' energy will be in the form of heat into the room! That is the appeal of storage heaters.

Nearholmer wrote: ↑10 Feb 2023, 7:37pm Improving the storage medium to maximise what it takes-up is another important point, because that reduces the energy leaked into a room during the heat-up phase, which is usually at night when most rooms are unoccupied, and everyone is tucked-up in nice warm beds.

They don't work that way. If you dismantle one, you will see it is heating elements, (a bit like the 'rings' on a 1970s electric cooker), surrounded by special bricks, surrounded by insulation that doesn't look too dissimilar to what people have in their lofts.

In the small hours of the morning, when the storage heater starts taking in energy, the bricks are relatively cool. This means there is very little heat transfer through the insulation and into the room. What this means in practice is that the heater only starts to get hot, and throwing out a lot of heat, after 5+ hours. As I have said previously, if the room in which the storage heater is situated is well insulated then it will work well.

Nearholmer wrote: ↑10 Feb 2023, 7:37pm Having 100% correct weather forecasts would help too, given that using storage heaters requires a good knowledge of what the temperature will be tomorrow. Unexpected warm weather can result in SH users opening their windows to get rid of excess heat!

With old storage heaters this is true, but for the past 30 years the manufacturers have been producing ones that can adjust automatically based on how cold it is in the room and what heat level it has been set to. In 25 years, and 26 winters, I have never had to open my windows to get rid of excess heat!

freiston wrote: ↑9 Feb 2023, 10:01pm Well I've measured and remeasured and still can't decide whether I'm normal or not.
Height 174cm (5' 8½")
Inside leg 82cm
BB to saddle top 71cm (straight up the seat tube)

For what it's worth, I am 173cm (5' 8") tall, with a BB to saddle top of 70cm (also straight up the seat tube), so I think you are normal, but possibly slightly 'leggy'.

I found my 70cm measurement through decades of trial and error. A couple of years ago I came across the Greg Lemond method for calculating saddle height, mentioned in the link below. His method came back with a measurement of 69.8cm, so I didn't alter my saddle.

https://www.pearson1860.com/blogs/1860- ... dle-height

axel_knutt wrote: ↑10 Feb 2023, 11:56am

squeaker wrote: ↑10 Feb 2023, 10:47am

853 wrote: ↑7 Feb 2023, 6:50pm I was speaking to someone today, and they mentioned Lot 20

I'd never heard of Lot 20, so I'm guessing many of you won't have either. It's all about legislation that aims to help manufacturers create EcoDesign products that use significantly less energy to provide heat to our homes. So the web site says ...

https://www.bestelectricradiators.co.uk ... ompliance/

I think I'm missing the point here (or rather how Lot 20 defines efficiency) as the linked article says

Under Lot 20, any heater classed as a ‘fixed electrical local space heater’ must have a minimum 38% efficiency rating if they produce heat of an output of 250W or higher.

Given that all the electricity put into a space heater ends up as heat (eventually, in one way or another), how is an efficiency of less than 100% result? Or to put it another way, does anyone know how is efficiency calculated under Lot 20?

Following their link to the EU specifications I just went down a rabbit hole into Wonderland, and got nowhere. Scrolling down the page to the tables, and also from this site, it looks as if that 38% has little to do with efficiency in any meaningful sense, it seems more like an exam mark, where brownie points are awarded for things deemed to be of merit.

Good to know it's not just me being thick, as I didn't really understand it either!

I only got to hear about it when I tried to get a new part for my mother's failed 5 year old Dimplex storage heater, and was told they didn't make parts for it as they were only building Lot 20 models and parts now. Thanks Dimplex , won't being buying your products again

In theory it will make more efficient electrical heaters, but in reality I'm not sure ...

UpWrong wrote: ↑9 Feb 2023, 11:27am Just had my bill for Jan. Yikes. I've come to the conclusion the patio doors are the biggest heat sink, even though they are double-glazed with full length lined curtains drawn all day. Next winter I shall find some insultation sheets to stick on all the glass for Dec/Jan/Feb. Does anybody have any recommendations?

I have double-glazed patio doors from 1997, which I would describe as thermally poor. See below my post from the 14th December 2022 for what I use successfully to reduce the heat loss.

viewtopic.php?p=1743409#p1743409

I was speaking to someone today, and they mentioned Lot 20

I'd never heard of Lot 20, so I'm guessing many of you won't have either. It's all about legislation that aims to help manufacturers create EcoDesign products that use significantly less energy to provide heat to our homes. So the web site says ...

https://www.bestelectricradiators.co.uk ... ompliance/

Jon in Sweden wrote: ↑2 Feb 2023, 4:57pm
I wonder if the British public will start to educate themselves about good building practice now that energy and mortgages are so expensive? Your average Persimmon home is awful, which ever way you look at it. Unless the market demand changes, or they are heavily legislated, the mass builders will keep pumping out the same rubbish.

That's the real problem; for the majority of the British public it would seem that as long as they have a (leased) Mercedes or Audi, an up to date iphone, and a detached home, they don't give a **** about anything else.

They're building a new estate close to me on what was good-quality agricultural land. Ninety percent of them are detached, 3,4 and 5 bed homes and they all have gas central heating. Rows of them, many with detached garages, seemingly only a metre or so apart.

We have a shortage of land to build on, a shortage of houses to buy and we're supposedly in a cost of living crisis. So why doesn't the government say to the builders that ninety percent of what they build has to be terraced flats and houses?

Jon in Sweden you are correct, but I think the only way we will get change is if the government legislates it; the majority of the British public seem quite happy to buy expensive rubbish.

roubaixtuesday wrote: ↑30 Jan 2023, 3:40pm
I don't think the issue with UK housing stock energy efficiency is picturesque Georgian properties with high ceilings...

Every former industrial city, or big town, in the UK has thousands of terraced houses built with solid walls. I don't know what the total figure is, but it's probably in the millions. A lot of these don't have front gardens, so any external cladding would reduce the pavement width or road width (if there is no pavement). And then, after the Grenfell Tower fire, there is a reluctance amongst owners, insurers and mortgage providers to cladding that might be flammable.

roubaixtuesday wrote: ↑30 Jan 2023, 3:40pm
Building standards were downgraded by the coalition govt back in the day, justified on the back of increasing housebuilding and "all regulation is bad". See how well that went.

I think it was more a case of improvements being put on hold and, as I said six weeks ago, the required amount of floor and wall insulation was increased by 50 percent last year.

853 wrote: ↑14 Dec 2022, 3:18pm
In terms of insulation they are. In June 2022 Building regs part L increased wall and floor insulation 50 percent to 150mm (6 inches). These are interim regulations, with even more strict ones expected from 2025

From 2025 newly built houses will not be able to be fitted with gas boilers. The expectation is that heat pumps will largely take their place

Jon in Sweden wrote: ↑28 Jan 2023, 2:37pm
The UK needs to up it's game and recognise it's part of a changing climate. I also believe that part of the reason that houses continued to be so badly built through the 20th century was North Sea gas. When energy is cheap, why insulate?

It's a different world we live in now.

As I mentioned, on the 14th of December last year, in 2022 the building regs for minimum levels of wall and floor insulation rose by 50 percent, with even more stringent requirements expected in 2025. Yes, minimum insulation requirements in the UK were a bit of a joke, but finally this has been addressed and taken seriously. Now all we need to do is knock down the older house and re-build them to the new standards

viewtopic.php?t=148868&start=1140

Biospace wrote: ↑26 Jan 2023, 5:52pm
Have you seen the fellow up on Lewis with his kite-based wind generation? https://windswept-and-interesting.co.uk/

I want one of these!

This is what we've been waiting for Cugel... just a shame it's only in development stage. They even have a forum, so you can follow and discus the latest in wind generated power

It's actually on Shetland, but in terms of weather and wind they're pretty similar so it makes no difference - unless you were planning to visit!

Jon in Sweden wrote: ↑24 Jan 2023, 5:40pm ... We were in Devon previously and our house was crap, but here in Sweden, we often have weeks at a time of sub zero temperatures and it has no affect on the internal temperature, other than that our electricity bill goes up a bit.

We just need to massively upgrade the insulation on our houses in the UK. There is nothing else for it.

I don't disagree with this. Can you please tell us what insulation your house in Sweden has, and what the standards are for newly built houses over there? I'm interested, (and I am sure many other people are too), because I'd like to know what we should be doing in the UK to insulate our houses to Swedish standards.

Thanks

Carlton green wrote: ↑18 Jan 2023, 9:34am
Something interesting (but bad) going on in North Carolina (an oil State): https://www.teslarati.com/anti-tesla-ev ... -proposed/
Kick back happens.

So what is bad about this?


What is wrong with equity? Why should the rich people who can afford EVs get free fuel, when the poor people have to pay for theirs?

axel_knutt wrote: ↑14 Jan 2023, 10:25pm
It's easier to see the wood for the trees if you look at the way the temperature varies on a section through the thickness of a cavity wall over a heating cycle. Take this plot of my all-but uninsulated house, it shows, over a 72 hour period, the temperature of the inside air, inside surface of the cavity wall, inside of the cavity, outside of the cavity, outside of the wall, and outside ambient, in that order, from top to bottom, and it compares those with the heating both timed and continuous.
.
Plot.png
Scale of the plot is 1sec to 1 hour, and 1V to 1C.

You can see that whilst the inside air temperature drops by 5.3 degrees over 7 hours (& 4.7 over 5 hours), the outside surface of the wall varies by only 0.1C over the daily cycle, and its mean difference above ambient is only about 10% lower with the heating timed than on continuous. This smoothing of the daily temperature variation is caused by the thermal resistance and heat capacity of the wall, and it's the reason why switching my heating off for 29% of the day saves only about 10% off the heating bill, because it's ultimately the outside surface of the wall that's losing heat to the outside air.

This is a great graph. I'm not sure that it would be practical/acceptable, but what would be really interesting would be to see this graph over 48 hours with the heat switched off completely - so we could see the shape of the graph over a longer period.

As I said, this might not be practical so I do understand that you may not be able to do this - particularly at present.

simonineaston wrote: ↑15 Jan 2023, 10:08am That's such a great chart! UK - the cold man of Europe. You'd think the gov would do something about it...

No it isn't. A sample of 80000 homes, from 11 countries, is too small to prove anything as it depends which 7300 homes in each country you looked at; it could be made to say anything that creator of it intended it to say

ANTONISH wrote: ↑11 Jan 2023, 5:17pm

Biospace wrote: ↑11 Jan 2023, 1:08pm Internal insulation for solid walls can affect the dew point and create condensation problems, below are a couple of discussions considering this.

http://www.greenbuildingforum.co.uk/new ... e=1#Item_0
https://www.heritage-house.org/damp-and ... ation.html

My younger son who is a carpenter has recently been working on old timber framed house in a coservation area - he was installing a breathable insulation to deal with this problem.

That is interesting, as Biospace is right about the possibility of condensation problems when insulating solid walls.

Can you get us any info on what products your son was using, and how he was installing them, as the people who need additional wall insulation the most are likely to be those without cavity walls.

Thanks