its not about heating you home up,its about keeping the heat from escaping

Oopsadaisy would very much like to know about fraught proofing problems external doors! ?

midgey it’s a bit like draught proofing except that you have an iPad that changes it to Fraught!!

Please may I have my whole house fraught-proofed Oopsadaisy1?

A friend told us one year,it was cheaper to keep the heating on low all the time.... the bill was astronomical! We down sized 10 years ago, classic fairly near the sea bungalow. Spent money while working,new double and triple A rated doors and windows,it was already cavity wall insulated. Extra thick layer in loft. Had gas Safe install new boiler, original was 25 years old, unable to get parts. Hubby replaced the huge rusty radiators, with much smaller one on internal walls. Spent pension lump sum on solar panels via council green scheme. Having said.....I'm 72 next month, went through the menopause at 42,and still have hot flushes!

notspaghetti of course you can, but it’s expensive !

Heat the body not the house - we have electric heated over throws, which can be worn as capes - lovely and warm and very very inexpensive to run - about 2p per hour

Our bungalow was built late 90s so still quite young, but the insulation is incredible. Never any cold spots in the house. But I agree that starting on oneself first is the priority. Lots of light layers of clothing does help one stay warm. No heating on here and when we do eventually put it on we only ever have the lounge and hall heaters on. I can't sleep in an overheated bedroom. The bathroom has a heated towel rail,being all electric we have to be aware of rising costs. Gas didn't reach our village.

Karmalady
I slept in the room over the garage as a child. No double glazing or heating. You are so right about it being beyond freezing! I used to reach out and snap off the icicles from the inside of the window.
Talk about ‘your tiny hand is frozen’
No wonder we were all ill all the time !

Agree with cossybabe. My DD bought me one of these last year. It was such a success, that I've bought one for DH this winter. Helps us keep the bills down.

amazon.co.uk/dp/B09YM4S7N7?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_dt_b_product_details]]

In case the link doesn't work properly:

It's a Bedsure Wearable Blanket Hoodie. Better than some of the cheaper models and not as expensive as the original Oodie.

If the bungalow was built with a gap between two outside walls have you considered wall insulation?
When my husband was alive we had this done which vastly improved a room that was once so cold to enter

cossybabe Agreed, really warm after a few minutes and lower bills. I have to switch off after a while as too hot. I also have an electric under blanket to heat up the bed before getting into it and have a 13 tog duvet to sleep warm without heating on.

We've had our Victorian semi lined with insulation boards (plasterboard backed with 50mm of rigid insulating foam. We also had our loft insulation topped up to 400mm. Total cost including replastering, electrics, radiator moving, skirtings, redecoration, etc, in the order of £20k. Very glad we did it though!

Google thermal rendering uk and see if there is anything there you could use.

Such a problem with older homes, and not cheap. We have a 1950s bungalow and decided against any external thermal render but have instead used Wallrock Thermal Liner on the external walls in the kitchen diner. The rooms faces north and was very cold last year before we did the work. We used the lighter weight product, followed by Fibre Liner and topped off with wallpaper. The walls are now warm to the touch - not perfect but better. Wallrock is applied with a special heavy duty adhesive, which itself is applied with a roller. Cutting using a curved blade and scissors for tough work, be warned though, this is not an easy job even with two.

I think if you suffer with condensation and mould in a room this internal insulation can really help, with an added bonus of reducing some noise from outside.

Late dh and I had a cottage in the central highlands until recently when I had to move. The cottage was timber framed and harled over, so little or no insulation until someone suggested insulated plaster board, (I think it was called kingspan) it was attached to the original plasterboard so we lost maybe a couple of inches all round , we had it done only to the walls which were external, it made a huge difference to warmth and cost

A few have mentioned thick carpets or laminate flooring. Do check out the layout of your home first. We ripped up the downstairs carpets in our Victorian terrace years ago and stripped the floorboards and discovered that we now have free underfloor heating as the hot water pipes run just under the floorboards. Plus we have a radiator and dehumidifier in the cellar and we now get some benefit from those in the living and kitchen area, instead of blocking the heat off.

Insulating foil behind radiators on any exterior walls can help throw their heat back into the room.

I bought myself a kudd.ly and a pair of slippers that have a heated little bag inside plus another pair of slippers for a dd. Buying 3 items was a very good price. The hoodie/blanket is amazing, it arrived yesterday, from the uk and is gorgeously warm and comfy, quite heavy and not past my calves. I got the pale pink, which may have been a mistake as it is pale and will need washing more often

I have popped it into its drawstring bag in the wardrobe and it will be excellent for cold days when I want to sit and be cosy. I had awful problems with getting an oodie and ended up with two because of their flash in the pan sales tactic. It was a present and they would not let me cancel and re-order so lucky person now has two oodies and I have a big debit

Quokka - our boiler is out of action at the moment too - waiting for a spare part - but we live in sunny Suffolk and a fairly new-build, so haven't missed the heating, just the hot water. I really don't think I will ever get used to cold showers, no matter how good they are supposed to be!! We have an immersion heater, but that's really expensive to use, even with our 16 solar panels.

we rent a park home have to use LPG for heating and its always cold in the winter even with the heating on we bought a electric heater early this year when we were faced with a two day power cut and it was so cold the difference was amazing in our living room it got to hot and we had to keep tuning it off and was surprised it didnt cost a lot to have on may use it during the day if it gets very cold this year instead of the heating

Oopsadaisy1

If you don’t want major construction work (that you probably won’t get your money back on, but would make you warmer) .
Then it’s

Double or triple glazing.
Fraught proofing external doors
Thick underlay and then carpet on floors
Heavy curtains will help
I would think that heavy wallpaper has got to help on the walls,
Don’t touch ceilings as you have loft insulation.
Leave heating on low 24 hours a day and boost when necessary.

No steps are ‘cheap’ but they will make your life more comfortable.

And of course wear layers of warm clothing and keep moving about, go out each day to warm places, garden centres are good to wander around in and get a cheap cup of tea. Or just a brisk walk.

These suggestions strike me as the best you have been offered so far, and mine are certainly not better.

I just want to add a word of caution: make quite sure before installing double or triple glazing, that at least one window in each room can still easily be opened for the five or ten minutes necessary to air the room properly every day.

Insulation is a good thing, but like all good things it has drawbacks, and one might well be more condensation indoors.

Likewise laying underlays and thick carpets down is fine as long as there is no rising damp.

In your place, I would ask a builder's advice, or that of the DIY store as to what is best in this kind of building. I have no idea what it is you are actually living in as dot and dab means nothing to me.

I don't think thicker wallpaper will make the slightest difference, but as I don't know what your walls are made of, I may well be wrong.

Yes, you want to stop heat escaping, but you also do need to prevent cold air getting in!

If double glazing is beyond your means, plexiglass or even thick polythene of the type used for damp-proofing between plasterboard and rockwool, can provide a less efficient, but cheaper form or double "glazing". Both plexiglass and polythene works best fitted to battens that have the right dimension for the inside of your window-frames and can be held in place by little swivel clips for window screens.

Do you remember secondary glazing? Glass in a metal frame that screwed around the single glazed windows, it had sliding panels

Grandtante, every room has to have a window that can open wide enough to act as an escape route in case of a fire

The cheapest way of providing some sort of window insulation is via cling film, which is what I did in the 70s. That plus a hair dryer. It was pretty good and came off well enough in spring

ventilation is just as important as insulation

I remember the days when we just had a coal fire in the living room and a boiler in the breakfast room to heat the water. I’ce on the bedroom windows. We wore thicker clothes then mainly wool because not a lot of synthetics had been invented.
Today I had phone call a man trying trying to sell me new double glazing after I told him that mine was twenty years old. I let him carry on until I told him I was ninety nine years old.
My bungalow has wall insulation and about three thicknesses of insulation in attic but at my age I am not bothered about the electricity bill.b

Ahhh bijou, congratulations on getting to 99. I do like your attitude

One thing that can help if there is the slightest hint of damp is a dehumidifier, a friend with a stone cottage on the top of a cold northern hill finds that if she uses it to draw the moisture out of the air it is warmer than without using it, and it is cheap to run. Damp makes the place chillier, if you ever dry clothes indoors then this helps them dry sooner and obviously cuts down on any damp from them