Persephone
Established Member
Hello everyone,
We are in the process of buying our first house. It is a small semi built in 1939. The same family lived there for 60+ years so it needs updating - rewire, central heating, etc. but it's got lots of potential.
I currently do hobby woodworking in my living room as I live in a rented apartment so I want a workshop. The house has a detached garage (approximately 18' by 8') built from preformed concrete with a cement roof in the 1960s. It looks solid but has not been cared for and the owners seem to have grown bramble bushes on the roof. At some point electricity was added. This runs from the consumer unit through an isolation switch into trunking that runs along the outside wall of the house and then spans a gap of approximately six feet to the garage. The trunking is damaged at this span exposing the twin and earth cable. In the garage cables feed three lights and several double sockets. Bare cables are tacket to the walls.
I have attached some photos but these are poor quality as I took them at the viewing.
I would be grateful of members' advice on whether I can modernise this garage to convert it to a workshop. At the moment I have a couple of questions around the structure and electrics.
I am thinking of insulating the walls, floor and roof with PIR around 60mm thick. Do I first need to cover all the interior surfaces with some sort of plastic water barrier? There is evidence of moisture seeping in through the walls where the garage runs alongside a concrete path that rises towards the rear of the garden. Should I coat these surfaces in some sort of oil based water repellent before the insulation goes on?
Do I need to leave a gap between the roof and the insulation?
I will then put a vapour barrier on the inside of the insulation and attach 18mm MDF sheets to the walls and roof. I'm going with MDF as it's dense and apparently better at reducing noise than OSB. For the floor I'll put down a vapour barrier then 18mm plywood.
I will also insulate the doors.
Does all of this seem like the right thing to do to make the structure useable as a workshop that's so close to the house (and neighbours)?
At present I am not sure if the garage has a consumer unit. I would like to fit one and run a 32 amp ring for sockets, a separate 16 amp radial for a 16 amp socket (I've been watching Laura Kampf and would like to have a go at welding) and a 6 amp radial for the lights. I would also like to replace the cable from the house consumer unit with an AWS cable and catenary wire.
I have purchased several LED lighting panels and dimmer switches from B&Q to replace the current strip lights. I will run the t&e for all wires on the surface using trunking.
My question here is whether I am allowed to do this myself? I am not an electrician though I do have a science background. As the infrastructure is already in place and I am replacing it because it is damaged is this notifiable work?
You might wonder why I am focusing on the garage rather than the house. Over the past few months I've acquired various pieces of workshop machinery (currently cluttering up my parents' house) and plan to use the workshop to do much of the house modernisation. The house will get a full rewire at some point but I want to get the workshop up and running straight away.
Anyway, for people who got this far on my lengthy post I'd be very grateful of your advice.
Thank you,
Steff
We are in the process of buying our first house. It is a small semi built in 1939. The same family lived there for 60+ years so it needs updating - rewire, central heating, etc. but it's got lots of potential.
I currently do hobby woodworking in my living room as I live in a rented apartment so I want a workshop. The house has a detached garage (approximately 18' by 8') built from preformed concrete with a cement roof in the 1960s. It looks solid but has not been cared for and the owners seem to have grown bramble bushes on the roof. At some point electricity was added. This runs from the consumer unit through an isolation switch into trunking that runs along the outside wall of the house and then spans a gap of approximately six feet to the garage. The trunking is damaged at this span exposing the twin and earth cable. In the garage cables feed three lights and several double sockets. Bare cables are tacket to the walls.
I have attached some photos but these are poor quality as I took them at the viewing.
I would be grateful of members' advice on whether I can modernise this garage to convert it to a workshop. At the moment I have a couple of questions around the structure and electrics.
I am thinking of insulating the walls, floor and roof with PIR around 60mm thick. Do I first need to cover all the interior surfaces with some sort of plastic water barrier? There is evidence of moisture seeping in through the walls where the garage runs alongside a concrete path that rises towards the rear of the garden. Should I coat these surfaces in some sort of oil based water repellent before the insulation goes on?
Do I need to leave a gap between the roof and the insulation?
I will then put a vapour barrier on the inside of the insulation and attach 18mm MDF sheets to the walls and roof. I'm going with MDF as it's dense and apparently better at reducing noise than OSB. For the floor I'll put down a vapour barrier then 18mm plywood.
I will also insulate the doors.
Does all of this seem like the right thing to do to make the structure useable as a workshop that's so close to the house (and neighbours)?
At present I am not sure if the garage has a consumer unit. I would like to fit one and run a 32 amp ring for sockets, a separate 16 amp radial for a 16 amp socket (I've been watching Laura Kampf and would like to have a go at welding) and a 6 amp radial for the lights. I would also like to replace the cable from the house consumer unit with an AWS cable and catenary wire.
I have purchased several LED lighting panels and dimmer switches from B&Q to replace the current strip lights. I will run the t&e for all wires on the surface using trunking.
My question here is whether I am allowed to do this myself? I am not an electrician though I do have a science background. As the infrastructure is already in place and I am replacing it because it is damaged is this notifiable work?
You might wonder why I am focusing on the garage rather than the house. Over the past few months I've acquired various pieces of workshop machinery (currently cluttering up my parents' house) and plan to use the workshop to do much of the house modernisation. The house will get a full rewire at some point but I want to get the workshop up and running straight away.
Anyway, for people who got this far on my lengthy post I'd be very grateful of your advice.
Thank you,
Steff
