24 April, 2009

 

Tim Renouf

Wren Industries

Unit 5, 19 Abbott St

SANDRINGHAM   VIC 3191

 

Dear Tim,

 

CONCERTINA FOIL BATTS – UNDER FLOOR INSULATION

 

I recently bought a lovely weatherboard house in beautiful Beechworth, North East Victoria, where it’s known to get very cold (even snows occasionally). The house has polished floor boards that would be criminal to cover up, but in the older part of the house, daylight was visible through quite a few of the joins! I heard that people who rented the house before I bought it said it was ‘freezing’ in winter. So with winter fast approaching I knew I had to do more than just organise extra heating, I had to do something about insulating under the floor.

 

I couldn’t find any insulation installers who would do under floor insulation on an existing house unless they could stand up underneath it, so that option was out! I did some research, and the Concertina Foil Batts came up as the best ‘do it yourself’ option for me. They were less costly and less bulky (so cheaper to get delivered to the North East) than the other options I considered. I was advised not to use anything that would be an attractive ‘home-space’ for rodents, and a local person in the business of heating and cooling and solar energy recommended the Concertina Foil Batts.

 

The job looked daunting!!! People asked me how I was going to do it (I’m a 53 year old single woman). My 25 year old son offered to come up from Melbourne and do it for me. I accepted. What he ended up doing (once we sorted the staples out) was to help me get started. I spent between 2 and 5 hours under the house one day each weekend for 4 weeks to get it all done (the house has a 133 square metre floor space). It’s one of those jobs that’s simple but not easy. Well, it was a poo of a job really, as there was lots of dirt and spiders and cobwebs and moving around in small spaces – but it was do-able and I did almost all of it myself!!!

 

Even before I had completely finished, I started to notice a difference in the warmth in the house. It seems to me the house has been holding the warmth more since the batts were installed. And yet, I am still to put shade-cloth around the baseboards as recommended, still to finish off the ceiling insulation, and still to get the heating installed in my living area. So I have every confidence that I’ll be warm this winter!

 

Everyone at Wren Industries was very helpful, accommodating and informative. I would recommend them and their product to anyone with cracks in their floorboards (and my friends would say, cracks in their heads). NO, it was a do-able job!

 

 

 

Private Homeowner (name withheld)

Beechworth

Victoria