General > General Technical Chat
"Gas Armageddon": Energy/electricity prices in EU/UK (and how to deal with them)
Siwastaja:
--- Quote from: tszaboo on August 31, 2022, 09:01:36 pm ---They were renovating small block of flats in Switzerland by adding 30cm styrofoam isolation on the outside.
--- End quote ---
I'm wondering how well this works, because generally vapor tight materials should go in one layer closest to the inside walls and coming out, rest should be vapor-passing, but I guess someone has proved by calculation that the styrofoam has low enough water vapor resistance (contrary to common misbelief, styrofoam is not nearly as vapor tight as plastic vapor barrier films or polyurethane sheeting).
Fire safety is a problem with styrofoam as shown in some spectacular cases in UK.
Here, the most common insulation material added outside is mineral wool, either glass or rock wool. These materials work outside pretty well because they let water vapor through and are also fire safe. The wool sheets added on the outside have an air-tight (but vapor-passing) surface coating (e.g. some moisture tolerant bitumen paper, or see Housewrap) because having wind blow through the wools would render them pretty much useless. But maybe styrofoam is cheaper. Thermal conductivity is roughly the same, something like 35mW/mK.
tszaboo:
--- Quote from: Siwastaja on September 01, 2022, 08:16:21 am ---
--- Quote from: tszaboo on August 31, 2022, 09:01:36 pm ---They were renovating small block of flats in Switzerland by adding 30cm styrofoam isolation on the outside.
--- End quote ---
I'm wondering how well this works, because generally vapor tight materials should go in one layer closest to the inside walls and coming out, rest should be vapor-passing, but I guess someone has proved by calculation that the styrofoam has low enough water vapor resistance (contrary to common misbelief, styrofoam is not nearly as vapor tight as plastic vapor barrier films or polyurethane sheeting).
Fire safety is a problem with styrofoam as shown in some spectacular cases in UK.
Here, the most common insulation material added outside is mineral wool, either glass or rock wool. These materials work outside pretty well because they let water vapor through and are also fire safe. The wool sheets added on the outside have an air-tight (but vapor-passing) surface coating (e.g. some moisture tolerant bitumen paper, or see Housewrap) because having wind blow through the wools would render them pretty much useless. But maybe styrofoam is cheaper. Thermal conductivity is roughly the same, something like 35mW/mK.
--- End quote ---
It's been the standard way of isolating new built houses or refurbishing houses all across East Europe. There is usually not two layers of bricks, for a long time the bricks are engineering bricks, with air channels, since a long time. Isolation goes on the outside, about 30-50 cm from the ground.
I've seen moisture issues, usually near bathrooms, that is easily solved with ventilation. Otherwise, dehumidifiers.
But that might not work well here, since the ground moves a lot more. Honestly, I'm not sure it's not my area of expertise.
And of course you end up with a house that looks different than the usual houses here.
nctnico:
Those bricks are intended for inner walls only! You can't use these for outside walls, read the datasheet. Last year I have looked into these bricks as a light weight solution to upgrade my shed but the specs say these aren't suitable for outside walls.
tszaboo:
--- Quote from: nctnico on September 01, 2022, 11:51:33 am ---Those bricks are intended for inner walls only! You can't use these for outside walls, read the datasheet. Last year I have looked into these bricks as a light weight solution to upgrade my shed but the specs say these aren't suitable for outside walls.
--- End quote ---
https://www.wienerberger.hu/termekek/porotherm-falazat/Falazoelemek/porotherm-38-n_f-tegla.html
--- Quote ---Egy igazán népszerű, klasszikus kerámia tégla, mely sokrétűen felhasználható. Egyaránt alkalmazható külső teherhordó fal, vagy válaszfal építésére.
--- End quote ---
"A really popular, classic ceramic brick that can be used in many ways. It can be used equally for the construction of external load-bearing walls or partitions."
Might be a fluke in the Dutch knowledge, like that other misinformation, you can only use heatpumps if your house is well isolated.
The other advancement that I saw was extremely thin layers of mortar, like 1mm. It requires the bricks to be sanded down accurately.
madires:
--- Quote from: tszaboo on September 01, 2022, 01:25:09 pm ---Might be a fluke in the Dutch knowledge, like that other misinformation, you can only use heatpumps if your house is well isolated.
--- End quote ---
You can heat your non-insulated home also with heat pumps, but you'll waste a lot of electric power. It's the same for any other energy source. Despite this forum being about electronics some people think that electric power simply comes out of the wall socket. Here's a question for you: how does that power get into the wall socket?
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version