We bought a victorian property this year, it has suspended timber floors at front and a concrete solid floor to rear. I don't believe there were vents put out of the back through the concrete extension. When we moved in we lifted the suspended timber floor and there wasn't any real sign of decay or rot, our builder replaced / repaired any dodgy looking joists and put in insulation and we've now laid a parquet floor which is not coming up again! . However a surveyor has now told me that i would have been better putting in a concrete floor instead of the suspended timber, as now there is air blocked to to rear of property restricting cross flow. My question is how can I increase the airflow now without lifting parquet floor? Is it possible to run an airvent through the concrete floor to the outside? Would that mean digging up the entire concrete floor at back?
- Thread starter geepee14
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- Glorious Gloucs
Hello and welcome.
In this topic where was some discussion of a similar problem.
In that case they were still able to lift the floor, and had side access. If your house is terraced that's more tricky.
There were presumably air vents at the back of the house and they should have been piped through the concrete to the exterior. Unfortunately there are a lot of cowboy builders who don't bother with such details.
If you know where the old vents were you could diamond saw the concrete slab and insert pipes to the exterior but that would cut the rebar or mesh, so might not be a great idea, even leaving aside all the mess.
Another possibility would be to drill lots of 1" holes adjacent to the back wall of the original house (ie the house before the extension) and put dado or full-height panelling on that wall with the air able to come up the back of the panelling and venting out of a gap at the top.
Not an easy one to solve, I'm afraid.
In this topic where was some discussion of a similar problem.
In that case they were still able to lift the floor, and had side access. If your house is terraced that's more tricky.
There were presumably air vents at the back of the house and they should have been piped through the concrete to the exterior. Unfortunately there are a lot of cowboy builders who don't bother with such details.
If you know where the old vents were you could diamond saw the concrete slab and insert pipes to the exterior but that would cut the rebar or mesh, so might not be a great idea, even leaving aside all the mess.
Another possibility would be to drill lots of 1" holes adjacent to the back wall of the original house (ie the house before the extension) and put dado or full-height panelling on that wall with the air able to come up the back of the panelling and venting out of a gap at the top.
Not an easy one to solve, I'm afraid.