Things to look for if your house or flat is in a city. The following problems could be missed by your builder or local company and could have unforeseen problems which will cost you extra money that you might not be aware of until its too late.

The problems are as follows:

If there is only one point of access into the flat. There may only be access through the front door. If there is no rear access to the property all the materials may have to go through the communal area or through the house. This could be at an extra cost as it will take longer. Plus no builder really wants to do this. As well as having to carry the materials up the 2/3 flights of stairs the team will have to go through tight turning corridors which is often very difficult.

If your house or flat is on a double yellow line or on a red route. It then might have a restriction like a certain day when the crane company can operate so it doesn’t restrict the flow of traffic. If its a Saturday or Sunday, the crane company could charge you or your company extra for a weekend slot and this cost is normally absorbed by the customer even though they may not know it at the start.

If there is a bus shelter and/or bus stop outside the property. This will cause similar problems to the point above but also you may not ever be able to use a crane for the build. This decision is made by the local council subject to health and safety to the general public. If you cant use a crane you/your company may have to use an electronic wench which is attached to the side of the scaffolding. It roughly costs the same amount as a crane but it takes alot longer to lift everything up onto the scaffolding and into the roof. Health and safety issues are also present with regards to storing materials on the front scaffold and working off it with such a busy street. One situation I’ve been in before is that there was a bus stop and shelter that where always in constant use, even on a Sunday the buses were running from 6am until midnight every 3 minutes… This is a major problem for a building company, the council and for your road. Also if the road is very slim it can cause issues for the crane delivering materials.

If your house is on or below a parade of shops there is also a major issues with the scaffolding. It will have to be netted, possibly have a scaffolding alarm fitted and be specially designed so the general public can safely walk underneath the building area. Costs are around £1000 on top of the quoted scaffolding cost.

Most of the points above will all need a scaffolding license as the health and safety implications are massive. There is also nowhere for the skip to go at the front of the property. If there is a side road you can apply for a permit form the council but if there are yellow lines on the side road there will be costs attached, approx £200+ a week which again will probably be missed but then get absorbed by the customer…

If there are no parking bays that can be suspended for the trades to park, the tickets will cost around £1 to £2 per hour in most cities. Trade permits can be available in some areas and are alot cheaper but will need to be arranged with the local council by the home owner.

At last, the planners are beginning to understand the demand for loft conversions.

I found this on the web and found it interesting,

Its from the Daily Mail

Click here

An Isolator Switch is a switch normally found above the bathroom door. Its only purpose is to let the owner decide if they want the extractor fan to come on or not when they switch the light on in the bathroom.

The extractor fan has to be installed in any new bathroom, Shower Room or W.C in any residential dwelling under the new building regulations so its not just for lofts its now for the whole house.

Some roof spaces are more easier to convert then others in terms of size, shape and construction.

The major thing you need to have when wanting to convert your loft is head hight. if theres lots of height there’s much more of a certainty that you will be able to convert your loft. The higher the better and even when you cant get planning permission for lets say a rear dormer if theres a good head hight, you can still just convert inside space of the loft and still make a very good sized loft room and maybe even a shower room or bathroom.

The minimum head height you will need to do a loft conversion is 2.2m (7′2″) but you will need a dormer as the space is so restricted.

If your loft is under 2.2m then its pretty much a non starter. It will still be worth getting a quote through from your local builder though as there is a special way not losing any height in the loft called triperling the joists, or you could lower the ceilings but that will depend on the windows on the 1st floor and if theres enough space.

You achieve this dimension by measuring the top of the ceiling joists to the underside of your ridge board.

Some builders you might come across may say they can convert your loft even if it a bit smaller but please do be very careful. If you decide to take your builder up on his offer do make sure you get some sort or agreement between you both before the build commences the works.

Imagine being 3 or 4 weeks into the build and the floor and stairs have finally go in… the last thing you want to be arguing about with your builder is the new bedroom head height. He’s promised you a good head height but it ends up being 5′6″

The reason you need 2.2m or more is because once the new steels and the floor joists have gone in over the existing ceilings, the head height will easily be reduced by 150mm (approx).

Secondly you have to allow for all the new plasterboard, plaster, insulation and carpet/wood flooring etc. Taking all this into account, the total height lost in the loft will be around 180 to 200 mm.

Obversely on a 2.2m high loft a finished head height would be around 2m (6′6″) which is fine if your only 5′ tall but if someone was 6′4″ was buying your house it may be a problem for the purchaser if they cant use the loft room properly…

There are a few ways to convert your loft without having a good head height though but please do take professional advice and discuss all of your options before beginning the loft project.

I saw this loft conversion and couldn’t believe my eyes. How this could get passed by the local council ill never know! (thats if it was ever passed in the first place)
For starters the dormer has been built at least two foot over the ridge beam and it was built facing a public road which makes it even harder to imagine it was given consent.

Its the most Awful shape and is half a dormer and half a mansard. HOW DISGUSTING!!!

Summary of changes in new approved document B, Volume 1 Dwelling houses in which will affect building a loft conversion.

This will become a major problem for the Loft conversion industry and for the customers wanting to convert there lofts.

You can read my fire regs post to see how the regs stand at the present date (pre April 7th 2007) but for every one who hasn’t or wont have time to serve the initial notice to the local authority before 7th April, will have to now build the loft to the new approved Document B.

These fire regs have been divided into two Volumes; Volume 1 covers Dwelling houses which is for houses, and Volume 2 is for every thing else including flats.

New Provisions that have been introduced are as follows:

The rescue window at the front of the house normally called the Velux M08 emergency velux has now been considered impractical. This window was designed for fire fighters to erect a ladder from the outside to rescue you in case of a fire. Now its known as impractical and unsuitable. In some peoples minds this will be a good thing as once its installed it is very low to the floor of the loft. This becomes a safety hazzard in itself due to infants or small children being able to open the window so high (around 5m high on average) and could fall out.

But when there’s a good point with the regs you can almost definitely expect something else to now be 10 times worse.

All the doors that divide the stairscase from living rooms (habitable rooms not including w.c’s, bathrooms or shower rooms) will need to be replaced with rated FD20 Fire doors.

This will be a nightmare for all those original Victorian and Edwardian doors that are part of the original character of the house. What’s been designed is a special fire paint that will upgrade your original doors to this new standard.

Self closing devices are no longer needed on all the doors because the government know that owners are removing them because children where constantly trapping fingers and/or the automatic closers were becoming annoying to live with. And so once removed the regulation was ineffective.

This is why FD20’s are now essential.

The next ammendment is in open plan ground floors of private dwellings, the area will need to be enclosed (which is how the old document stands now) or you will need to provide sprinklers on the ground floor and separate the stairs at first floor level to provide a suitable escape from a window on the first floor in the case of a fire on the ground floor.

Smoke alarms are now required to all circulation spaces on all floors and will all have to be mains wired with a battery back up.

If you want to avoid changing all your doors or avoid painting them with a thick coat of fire paint to upgrade them, make sure you either start work on site or serve your initial building notice to your local authority on or before the 6th of April 2007.

If you do, this means you will be able to still build under the old approved document B regulations if it is what you want to do…

See our Building regs Category for more deatils.

Fire Doors
Fire resisting doors also known as FD20/30’s are vital to contain smoke in a room for a sufficient time for you to become aware of the fire and able to evacuate the building safely and efficientley.

There must be 1/2 hour fire resitant partitions to separate the landing from the rooms in the new loft conversion, and the doors around the stairs must be fire check doors, and be fitted with door closers.
The code which is numbered either 20 or 30 of the fire door defines the time span of how long that door will survive in the case of a fire. The doors rating will be decided by your building inspector, and will be on your plans for the builder.

An FD20 is a fire door that lasts for 20 minutes in the case of a fire. normally 40mm thick, solid or compressed wood and will also need a door closer near the hinge so that the door will close automatically.

This is a picture of a door closer that would need to be installed on the back of all the doors around the stairs to meet building regs. 

An FD30 is a 30 minute fire door and from the end of May 2007, word of mouth between Building Inspectors is that all doors around the stairs will have to now be upgraded to FD30’s.

This is not good news for all the owners of beautiful Victorian and Edwardian houses with their original doors that are part of the history and character of their house… 

We believe that there will be a special paint that the existing doors can be covered in to give them the fire protection to meet the new fire regs. For more details ask your builder or Building control officer.

This regulation also goes for any glass in existing doors around the stairs, it will need to be replaced with either a wired glass, the sort of glass that is found in most schools. (click on the picture to enlarge the sample) This is the cheapest sort of fire glass at around £150 per m2 but looks quite cheap. The second grade of fire glass is called Pyroglass and even though it’s more expensive at around £300 per m2 it looks like real glass, It is basically the same glass that is used in oven facias. You buy all the fire glass made to measure and fitting would cost around £50 or so direct with your builder. You must really love your existing doors to take up this option…

Unfortunately this also means any glass panels above doors including fan lights, glass blocks or any sort of gap between a room and stairs will all have to be blocked up permanently either by plasterboard and plaster or fire glass.

If the glass is fire proof it will have a fire proof rating stamp in one of the bottom corners etched with the British Standered BSI kite mark (see picture) triangle. Next to the Kite mark will be an ISO number similar to this BS EN ISO 12543. This specifies the grade of the glass that has been installed. This will all be checked by the inspector before it’s passed off. Visit British Standards at www.bsistandards.co.uk for more infomation.   

This doesn’t effect doors that are not directly onto the stair area e.g between the lounge and dinning room. These doors can be normal glass.

Staircase Enclosure

A full staircase enclosure is needed from the new loft room/s, down to the front door to provide the first means of escape should a fire start in your house.

The stair enclosure is a major part of the fire regs, and to get all your building regulation certificates at the end of the build you will need the fire escape signed off by your inspector.

This enclosure is designed so if a fire happened there will be an escape from the new bedroom in the loft right down to the ground floor without going through any other living room that could be on fire.

If you have an open plan ground floor this will need enclosing to meet with all fire regulations.

There are 3 ways of doing this:

1. One way is to put a wall from the bottom of the stairs to the front door. As this is classed as part of the new building works being done to the house, the door into the lounge or kitchen (or where ever the wall has divided) this door will have to be a fire door normally called an FD20.

2. The second way is to put a temporary wall in to meet fire regulations and make it look like it’s permanent and then take it down once it’s been signed off by the inspector. I don’t agree with this solution as the reg’s are there for a reason but lot’s of people do take it down. 

Please note that this could effect your home insurance and invalidate your policy so please do be careful.

Also when you sell your house and the survey is being done on your property it will come up as a major issue on your buyers report. This could affect the sale of the property as well.

3. The third way is to install a fire sprinkler system. It is a fantastic option but is the most expensive. If the stairs go up to the 1st floor in an area where you can’t really put a wall this may be the only option the Building control will allow you to do.

Please note that you cannot knock a wall down around the stairs making it open plan after applying for building regs approval. The Building control will only make you rebuild it which will just be a pain and a waste of money. I suggest that if you want to remove a wall between the stairs and a lounge or kitchen, you have your builders do this before involving the building control. You will have to make it look like its been like this for a while (a year or two) and then you should get away with this. You will still need to have fire sprinklers to pass the loft. If you try to ask for sprinklers when you have a perfectly good wall there already, it will ruin any chance you haveof having it removed in the future as your building control officer will now be aware.    

Rescue Windows
A window should be set on the front of the roof to be used as a means of escape the most commonly used window is an M08 Velux (see Velux post for sizes).

The size of the window when open should be at least 550mm wide x 800mm high. And this needs to be in the new room NOT on the landing, this is because it is meant as a means of escape if the stairs and landings become filled with smoke.

There should be enough space for the fire brigades ladder direct from the ground and pitched at a 3 in 1 angle.

Smoke Alarms
Smoke alarms should be fitted in the stairway, one in the hallway, one in the landing and one in the new loft conversion, this is the minimum standard. They should be mains powered, and they can be connected to the lighting circuits, that way there are no batteries to replace.

Staircases
The stairs are where most accidents happen in the home, so it’s important that the new stairs are safe, and the existing stairs are not made unsafe. At least 2.0m headroom is needed over the exsiting stairs. The new stairs headroom can be reduced which might allow the flight to fit under a hipped roof.

The landing should be the same width as the stairs, and there is no minimum width for the stairs, a width of 750-800mm works well, and doors must open away from the stairs.

The New Loft
If the dormer is less than 1.0m from the party wall the side of the dormer must provide 1/2 hour fire resistance from inside and outside

Eaves ventilation, at least 25000mm squared per linear metre, equivalent to a continiuos 25mm ventilation gap.
Ridge ventilation, at least 5000mm squared per linear metre, equivalent to a continious 5mm ventilation gap.

A 50mm air gap must be left above the insulation, so the roof joists need to be at least 150mm deep, and because rafters are usually 100mm deep, they need 50mm battening under them. This is because water vapour rises through the ceilings and can condense out, above the insulation which can cause structural damage and unsightly stains.