Sorry can't help with thermal images but my own experience of doing up our 10 year old house is that daub and dab is a joke for air tightness. In just one room I disovered the plasterboard on the ceiling in places was an inch too short allowing a path from loft space into the room and plasterboard, it was covered up so to speak with coving.

Although an attempt had been made at the top and bottom of the plasterboard to have a continous run of plaster it in practice had many voids, but worse still is at the sides no attempt had been made to seal in the air, one room simply allowed air to pass into the next. Then the soil pipe is not air tight or properly insulated so the air from room to room can be drawn up into the loft space to be replaced by cold air.

Our house uses metal studs for the partition walls, the studs have big holes and although some of the partitions are insulated with rockwool you can clearly see even after 10 years where draughts are an issue because of all the dirt / soot on the rockwool. Then you have all the cuts for pipework, electrical, etc making it easy for cold air to circulate and warm air to escape.

So I think you once wrote that the use of daub and dab with plasterboard is like living in a tent is pretty accurate, that or thinking a sieve is a good idea for boiling water.

Paul

Thanks,

Take some more please!!! If possible of some real dry linings.

...Being slightly opportunistic, this thread prompts the question: Is it possible to rent/borrow a thermal imaging camera such as the one used above? [in the Manchester, UK area]

Aside from waiting for this to arrive:
http://www.robhopeless.com/2012/09/thermal-imaging-phone-camera.html
http://www.rhworkshop.com/

I have been fortunate to have been able to see the whole story behind blob and dobbed walls recently with a builder being able to completely take down the outside brick shin and the inner blockwork on a late 1990's wall between a living room and a garage to extend the lounge. At this time NHBC rules under which the house was built sais "complete ribbons of adhesive" the blockwork had cracks and gaps and there were holes round the joist ends. As the wall was between the house and garage it had no cavity insulation.

It's the smoking-gun evidence - almost as important as https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=807953379222467

All this proves is that quality of workmanship is not what it is supposed to be.

Problems like this are common to many building practices

eg.

Loft Insulation incorrectly installed at eaves
Partial fill Cavity wall Insulation missing/not fixed adequately /not taped
Hit and miss retro filled cavities - due to poor assessment or poor filling or both

The codes of practice for all of these are there - and they work if done correctly - including so called blob and dob the problem lies with them not being done as specified.

On the subject of blob and dob - no one ever seems to mention that EWI adopts the same blob and dob practice for fixing the Insulation to the wall - why is this?

Mike, I'm even more worried about EWI systems which do not use adhesive - too much scope for thermal by-pass. I hope to have 2 walls of my house EWI'd, and will be insisting on a full adhesive bed and mechanical fixings.

You saying that the death of over 3000 workers was a fake?

Posted By: Nick ParsonsEWI systems which do not use adhesive - too much scope for thermal by-pass

AFAIK air cavities don't necessarily mean thermal bypass. Thermal bypass is when an air cavity or passage allows a path between hot and cold zones, so convection currents arise which transfer heat, bypassing the insulation.

That's not the case with narrowish air layers, of similar width to those in multipane glass units, which lie transverse to the general direction of heat flow. In that orientation, air layers actually add to overall insulation, provided the cavity width is narrow enough to impede the establishment of convective 'cells'.

It's different if the cavities lie parallel with the general direction of heat flow, like the joints between EWI block edges. Such cavities provide a path direct between extremes of hot and cold, and even if only fag-paper width, there's strong convective urge, and a lot of frontal area, if you total up all the unfoamed EPS edge joints.

So it's actually advantageous to fix your EPS blocks by dot n dab rather than continuous bed. The resultant narrow air cavities add to overall insulation.

The only way such an air cavity might still act as a bypass, is if it's continuous over wide areas of the wall face. Different areas of the wall will be at different temperatures, so a continuous cavity might act as a path between hot and cold. So make sure each air cavity behind the EPS is no more than 1m2 (about 2 EWI blocks), dividing up by continuous ribbons of adhesive, with dots in between.

Hm, you may be right about the 'distant' building - but the right wing also goes 'behind' the corner of the target building for a moment - explanation?

You're saying that the building sliced up the jet, not the jet sliced into the building? Remarkably clean slicing - why no rain of bits that didn't get through the slicer?

AtomicBISF wrote: ''As for the blobbing, isn't there a case that methods that are inherently prone to shoddy short cuts should be prohibited?''

Tony's suggestion is that it *was* 'prohibited' -or at least contrary to NHBC guidance - at the time it was built. The problem is that either no-one is looking, or they are not prepared, if they do spot 'blob and dob' to insist that it be ripped off.

And FT, I agree that it *may* not be an issue with EWI, particularly if you ''.....make sure each air cavity behind the EPS is no more than 1m2 (about 2 EWI blocks), dividing up by continuous ribbons of adhesive, with dots in between.'', but then in my view, that's not really dot and dab.

Nick

Posted By: fostertom

Posted By: SteamyTeathe death of over 3000 workers was a fake?

Not at all - just a 'strategically worth it' Pearl Harbour re-run, to get America into a new war.

I too was sceptic/agnostic about 9/11 conspiracy theory, but not for a while now. Just like the notion that America's middle east wars were about oil hegemony, not freedom and democracy, took 10yrs to become "well, obviously" common wisdom.

Yes, this film may or may not itself be a fake, either by the guy who 'filmed' it and prob made lotsa money out of it, or by the CIA, or by the conspiracy theorists. Planes did hit the buildings, and 3000 were killed and lots more poisoned. It looks though like the whole thing was correographed, including the classic controlled demolitions by placed explosives - including the third tower which wasn't hit by anything.

That certain interests benefited from the attack doesn't mean they were involved. Controlled demolition is simply too implausible given the number of charges that would be necessary, being installed in buildings that were in use. I think this story gained traction because some conspiracy theorists couldn't understand some basic physics, such as the windows blowing out below the zone of collapse due to air pressure produced by the collapse of the floors above. This superficially looked like demolition charges. Much like they couldn't or wouldn't understand that steel looses much of its strength at well below the temperature at which it melts and started wittering about the temperatures not being high enough.

Besides, if you're going to the trouble of crashing two planes into buildings, why is demolition necessary? And if the whole thing had been planned to facilitate the invasion of Iraq, surely it was a major flaw in the conspiracy to fail to make it appear the attack had anything to do with Iraq? The whole thing is wildly implausible.

And nobody walked on the moon, they were only in Arizona.

/sarcasm alert/

>>Just like the notion that America's middle east wars were about oil hegemony, not freedom and democracy, took >>10yrs to become "well, obviously" common wisdom.

Woah there. That's a very different assertion - many of the banners at the anti-war protests before the invasion of Iraq suggest that was a widely held belief before the first bombs fell.

9/11 being a conspiracy is a very different thing.

Would that have been to secure a very small supply (still not done after 23 years), or because they started trading in Euros instead of Dollars.

'Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.'