Insulation update...

Well the insulation situation has progressed quicker than I indicated yesterday. Yesterday ended up being a very cloudy and cold day, so instead of putting off my great adventure into the ceiling, I decided to get up there after the kids were in bed and get it over with.

It was a bit of effort to wriggle down into the space, but once there, although it was fairly squishy there was enough space that I could rotate from lying on my back to my front (as opposed to the 'beached whale' situation that Peter felt like he was in on the weekend). I also had taken up some prodding sticks to help, the most useful I found to be our long pruning saw pole (without saw attached), as it is longer than a normal broomstick. The result is that I installed insulation to cover the whole of our bedroom ceiling that is humanly possible to access (so some of the far reaching edges aren't done, but unless you lifted the roofing iron there is no way of getting it in there) - in 1 hour! Although this morning the backs of my arms are covered in bruises (which may make some people concerned if they don't know how I got them), plus I really think they need to sell 'butt pads' at Bunnings - I had ones for my knees, but have matching bruises on both thighs from sitting on the joists. So now the hardest part is done, the rest should be a lot quicker and easier (and we think we like the doing it in the evening thing after the kids have gone to bed).

The other discussion that Peter and I have been having as a result of all this is...What would the commercial insulation companies have done? We had 3 companies come and give us quotes last year and each of them just poked their head through the manhole and shone a torch around. Then based their quotes on an external measurement of the area of the house and the thickness of insulation needed. Using this method means that none of them would have been able to see around the corner of the L to see how tight and limited the access is to that end of the house. And it would be very rare to find an insulation installer smaller than me...so what would have they done?

a) discovered job was going to be harder than first thought and try to charge us more money; or

b) discovered the inaccessibility and told us that it wouldn't be possible to insulate that part of the house - and our room would stay totally uninsulated; or

c) discovered the inaccessibility and just shove the insulation in as far as they could reach and not tell us - and our room would either stay totally uninsulated or at best still feel like a fridge as it would only be partially insulated.

Our conclusion is that our decision to DIY has been the best decision we could have made and not just from a financial point of view (although this was the major reason we originally made the decision to DIY the insulation). Because we aren't ruled by job sheets or profit lines we know that our room is insulated as best as possible without ripping out the ceiling or taking off the roof.