Lack of Ventilation / Condensation in Bedroom.

Baxtardo

I am starting to see mould spots in the ceiling / front wall of upstairs main bedroom. The house is a 1930s mass concrete construction, mid terrace.

I think there are a few issues and wondering which is the most important to tackle first. Starting off, there are no vents in the room. Coring a hole out of a 300mm solid concrete wall will be a fairly big job so am thinking of replacing windows with new units with trickle vents. I'm not sure if this will provide adequate ventilation however? The room is 12m2.

Secondly, the front portion of the ceiling has no insulation as it meets the pitch of the roof. A purlin in the attic is blocking any access to get loft insulation in this zone. Elsewhere there is 300mm of loft insulation in the attic. My options here are either to hire someone out to see if a blown loose insulation will get into this zone, or dryline the ceiling with insulated plasterboard?


Condensation is quite bad already - each morning the cold area of the ceiling is wet with water dripping down the walls. I'm unsure if it is more important to tackle ventilation to the room or the lack of insulation to ceiling. Any advice is appreciated. It's a very common style of terraced council built house and detailing so I imagine these issues are common enough.

Thanks.

Thanks.

BryanF

Open the window ever night someone sleeps in the room, clean mold, assess again in the spring.

Don’t insulate the underside, insulation in the attic would be better, rolls could be used, and may be easier to control the install, attic ventilation should also be checked.

Ensure the room gets heated daily, get a cheap thermometer /Rh sensor and review periodically

Hole in the wall will Be better to retrofit mech local controlled system, when compared to trickle vents

Baxtardo

BryanF wrote: »

Open the window ever night someone sleeps in the room, clean mold, assess again in the spring.

Don’t insulate the underside, insulation in the attic would be better, rolls could be used, and may be easier to control the install, attic ventilation should also be checked.

Ensure the room gets heated daily, get a cheap thermometer /Rh sensor and review periodically

Hole in the wall will Be better to retrofit mech local controlled system, when compared to trickle vents

I wonder would ventilating into the attic be an option? The attic is cold with tiles bonded directly to rafters and no membrane - ie plenty of fresh air getting in.

Insulating the attic is the tricky bit as I can't get access into the front portion which is causing a cold zone to the ceiling beneath. There is just no room to get a roll or even an arm in to fit. Hence I was thinking of looking at blown insulation since you might be able to get a nozzle in to the space.

Calahonda52

Certainly no need for new windows, tricks vents are not great anyway

Any pictures of the tough place to insulate

BryanF

Ventilating in to an attic space from a habitable room is typically frowned upon. Ventilation should be to the external. You could vent through the attic, pipe to vent tile/slate.

Baxtardo

Calahonda52 wrote: »

Certainly no need for new windows, tricks vents are not great anyway

Any pictures of the tough place to insulate

Attached is a picture of the attic. There is 100mm loft roll between joists and the new stuff is 200mm I laid across the top when we moved in - it's pulled back to show the junction. The purlin is blocking access into the front of the attic, and the attic space tapers to nothing at the front of the roof. It's this bit beyond the purlin that is inaccessible and uninsulated so causing condensation to the bedroom beneath.

Calahonda52

Not the answer you want but I would strip the roof, do the insulation properly, with ventilation baffles and then put on proper roofing felt, having ventilated the eaves. ps thanks for posting the picture

listermint

You could push insulation carefully to the front of that with a pole. By carefully I mean not far enough to block the ventilation into the rafters .

But easily doable

Baxtardo

If I did manage to get insulation in would it be as important to maintain ventilation at eaves given the roof type? My thinking is that there is air getting in everywhere through the bonded slates so perhaps not as important as with a modern roof construction? There are no vents in the eaves / soffits currently.

Idbatterim

Can’t you open a window fractionally to see what difference that will make ?

Lumen

Dumb suggestion/question, but what is that yellow sheet material doing?

Is it possible that condensation or penetrating rain is running down the back of that sheet and wetting the ceiling from above?

Regarding the bedroom I would put in a proper vent and proper windows, not trickle vents.

Baxtardo

The sheet material is 1mm MDF which the previous owners put in - presumably to catch dust / mortar falling from roof slates.

Thanks for all the advice - bit of a tricky one but I think I will try again to get insulation in to the front of the attic and take it from there. We won't be doing any major work on the house for a few years so will have to do ad-hoc remedies for the time being.