ENERGY MATTERS

[Pluggy]

The last remaining Magnox nuclear station, Wylfa on the north coast of Anglesey (or the half that is still running) will close in December next year, Reactor 2 was closed down in 2012, Reactor one has had its lifetime extended several times, but they will run out of Magnox fuel next year. We visited it whilst on holiday, the Visitors centre displays are years out of date, and they haven't done Station tours since 2001. There a noises about another consortium building another much larger plant on the same site, but its still in the planning phase and they are awaiting a decision from the government on how much they will pay for nuke electric before they start in earnest. Its won't open until the mid 2020's at the earliest if it happens at all. Wylfa has been generating since 1971.

[Stanley]

David, my Tilley lamps and candles are ready as is the stove!

[Stanley]

I did an audit of anti-power cut measures yesterday. I have plenty of coal, kindling, candles, paraffin, methylated spirits and spare mantles in stock. I think I'm as ready as I can be.... Did you know that paraffin is £6.50 for four litres?
House is cooling down but heat has not kicked in yet. Kitchen is warm enough with cooking and waste heat from the fridge but the rest of the house feels a bit chilly even though it is still at 20C. Must be me.... It';s noticeable that calm weather doesn't affect the house as much as windy weather. As soon as there is any meaningful wind the heating will fire up as the core drops below 18C. I notice some heating systems already working and smoke from some stoves.... Their shirts must be thinner than mine!

[Stanley]

The CH must have been listening to me... It cracked on this morning at about 04:30 but never even warmed the radiators.... We're getting close to the heating season again.

[Tizer]

Our dormer rooms now have their 50mm of insulation foam board on the exterior walls and roof, new waterproof membrane fitted and the hanging tiles replaced. On Saturday I added a layer of 200mm thick mineral wool over the existing mineral wool on the back walls of the rooms which are against a cold loft. Next step will be the kitchen and dining room walls! It's expensive work and people are quick to tell me that I'll never recover the outlay cost - but it's not all about saving money, there's the comfort factor too. A well insulated room that doesn't need much heat pumping into it is more comfortable to live in than a poorly insulated one with radiators convecting heat around for most of the time.

[Big Kev]

The insulation in the floor, used for the underfloor heating, and the very well insulated kitchen extension has made a lot of difference here. Not seen the room temperatures drop below 18.5 yet. I'm almost looking forward to it getting colder to test out the new heating set up

[Tizer]

The foam insulation is marvellous. All our downstairs rooms have concrete floors made in the 1960s or earlier. The ground floor bedrooms at the back have a slightly lower floor level than at the front of the house so we took advantage of that and covered them with 50mm of polyiso foam board (PIR, Xtratherm) topped with a floating floor and it feels totally different.

[Stanley]

This old house must be reasonably efficient. Core temperature still hovering between 21C and 23. Kitchen can get down to 19C but only on the coldest days. If the stat was in here the heating would never come on!

[Tizer]

A question for anyone who has a condensing tumble drier because I don't have any experience of using one. I understand how it works, rather like a dehumidifier removes moisture from the air and therefore you don't need an outlet to the outside of the house, the exiting air simply goes back into the same room. But the air going into the drier is heated so what sort of temperature is the air coming out of the machine, once it's had the moisture removed?

I'm asking because the tumble drier will be in a small utility room, essentially a passage from the kitchen to the back yard with two doors, one into the yard, the other into the kitchen. It will be unheated but well insulated with foam in a timber frame construction and will get warmth from the kitchen wall and by air passing around the door. When the drier is operating, it will be recirculating air from the utility room and I was wondering what effect it would have on the temperature in the room.

[plaques]

Sorry I haven't got one but the explanation can be found here Link They are slightly different from a de-humidifier in that the air is continuously circulated through the heater / dryer /cooler and does not enter the room.

[Stanley]

If the air is recirculated and energy is being put into the machine the laws of physics say that the dryer would give off heat into the room.

[Big Kev]

A question for anyone who has a condensing tumble drier because I don't have any experience of using one. I understand how it works, rather like a dehumidifier removes moisture from the air and therefore you don't need an outlet to the outside of the house, the exiting air simply goes back into the same room. But the air going into the drier is heated so what sort of temperature is the air coming out of the machine, once it's had the moisture removed?

I'm asking because the tumble drier will be in a small utility room, essentially a passage from the kitchen to the back yard with two doors, one into the yard, the other into the kitchen. It will be unheated but well insulated with foam in a timber frame construction and will get warmth from the kitchen wall and by air passing around the door. When the drier is operating, it will be recirculating air from the utility room and I was wondering what effect it would have on the temperature in the room.

We have a condensing drier in the cellar and yes, it does heat the room.

[Pluggy]

Testing after repair of Database

[Tizer]

Thanks for sorting the `SQL problems' Pluggy, they stopped me completely on Wednesday evening, I couldn't get into any thread. Earlier, when it was OK, I'd put a post here about condensing tumble driers with a built in heat pump to recover the heat. They use half the amount of energy required by the equivalent machine without a heat pump. Looking at John Lewis machines you can buy the heat pump model for only £30 more than the standard one.

[David Whipp]

Curiously, when I clicked on 'reply' the most recent post seemed to disappear...

[David Whipp]

There now though!

Like the idea of heat pump - hopefully though, our relatively recent investment in a condensing dryer (I wanted a vented one...), will last us for many years...

[Tizer]

Why did you want a vented one, David (other than being contrary! )? In winter they suck out the warm air from your room and dump it outside. You pay to heat your house and then waste it by pushing out the warm air and drawing in the cold. Or is it just that you like a cold house, haha!

[David Whipp]

Fear of condensation... (not that I've got a morbid terror of it, of course!).

Our house has a stone outer skin, brick inner, virtually no cavity - and what there is bridged by through stones tying the wall together.

Where we could, we have insulated the house to (what was 15 years ago) a high level. This is just the roof and the ground floor though. We didn't want to lose space by dry-lining with insulated boards and externally insulating our stone walls is a bit of a no-no.

It was never designed to be a Passivhaus with modern airtight elements; it's probably as leaky as an old tin bath, but I still have concerns about pumping water vapour into it.

So I worry about thermal bridging where the throughs are and interstitial condensation there and in other parts of the fabric.

To be fair, I've not noticed a problem with the condensing dryer (though that may be helped by having the window open for the cats in that room anyway...).

What is annoying is its frequent calling to us to empty its condensate tank...!

[Big Kev]

What is annoying is its frequent calling to us to empty its condensate tank...!

Ours has the drain pipe running into the same waste as the washing machine, no need for the on-board tank.

[Stanley]

In the 1930s and 40s there was a vogue for painting interior walls with gloss paint. The first house I lived in in Stockport had them. It was a modern build with a brick cavity wall and in humid weather condensation ran down the windows and walls! Single glazing of course and Crittall steel frame windows. In winter the condensation froze on the inside of the windows except in the living room and kitchen. Lovely Jack Frost patterns and a hot penny gave you a peephole! How things have changed......

[David Whipp]

The last of our metal framed opener, single glazed windows, is still with us at Bank Edge.

It's a stained glass leaded window on our half landing. We didn't want to get rid of the window when we installed double glazing throughout the rest of the house.



As a lad, I had the same experience on winter mornings with Jack Frost...

[Stanley]

The biggest problem with the Crittall frames was the fact that they expanded and contracted. Glass had to be fitted so that there was some breathing room and special metal casement putty used which remained slightly elastic. Ordinary linseed oil putty eventually set like concrete and cracked the windows in cold weather.

[Big Kev]

The last of our metal framed opener, single glazed windows, is still with us at Bank Edge.

It's a stained glass leaded window on our half landing. We didn't want to get rid of the window when we installed double glazing throughout the rest of the house.



As a lad, I had the same experience on winter mornings with Jack Frost...

I spent several months, the 1980's, draught proofing Crittals windows on a small tenement block in Kinston, Surrey. The job required cling film, washing up liquid and silicone sealant, it worked really well. I reckon this should also be in Tips not Found in Woman's Weekly

[Tizer]

In one of our earlier houses with single frame windows I bought perspex sheet, cut it to the size of the frames, then fitted that adhesive magnetic strip on the edges of the sheet and on the frames. The perspex sheet then sat on the magnetic strip and did a good job considering the low cost! The house was built in the 1970s and we didn't get any condensation problems.

David, you could now replace that stained glass window with a uPVC double-glazed one with coloured glass that would look good. We have a `stained glass' d/g window in our kitchen door to the garden.

[plaques]

David. I know a local man who would fit your stained glass inside a sealed double glazing unit. Worth thinking about if it is causing you some concern.