Ceiling Insulation in Shepparton & the Goulburn Valley

Building in Shepparton & the Goulburn Valley

Postwar and 1960s to 80s brick veneer through Shepparton, Kialla and Mooroopna, with older housing in the surrounding townships of Tatura, Numurkah and Kyabram. Some of the hottest summers in the state and cold, foggy winters.

The housing stock

Postwar and 1960s to 80s brick veneer through Shepparton, Kialla and Mooroopna, built in volume as the irrigation district grew, with older housing in the surrounding townships of Tatura, Numurkah, Kyabram and Congupna. Conventional pitched roofs on most of the stock with reasonable access and proper working room near the ridge. The defining point about this housing is that it was built for a climate with extreme summer heat and the older stock was not built with that in mind at all, so ceilings that would be merely inefficient in Melbourne are a serious comfort problem here. Corrugated iron is common on the older township houses and puts a great deal of radiant heat into the space above the plaster.

What changes the job here

• Extreme summer heat, which makes an uninsulated ceiling a serious comfort problem rather than a minor one
• Conventional pitched roofs with reasonable access through most of the stock
• Original insulation where present is generally thin and well settled

Access and local constraints

Access is generally good, with wide streets, proper driveways and room to park close to the house, which matters more for a removal than an install because the extraction line has a working length. Conventional pitched roofs with workable clearance across most of the housing, and manholes usually in a hallway or a garage rather than somewhere awkward. The distance from Melbourne makes this a region to work in blocks rather than one property at a time, and the surrounding townships at Tatura, Numurkah and Kyabram need grouping with the Shepparton properties for a run to make sense at all.

Climate and timing

Some of the most extreme summer heat in the state, with sustained runs of very high temperatures rather than the one or two day spikes Melbourne gets. Winters are cold and foggy, with the valley holding damp air for days at a time. An uninsulated ceiling here is a serious cost and comfort problem in both seasons, but the summer case is the one that brings people to the phone, which makes this region unusual for this activity. Roof space work is scheduled for early morning through the hotter months and stopped by late morning, because the afternoon is genuinely unsafe rather than merely uncomfortable. That shortens the working day and it is the main reason properties here need grouping into runs.

What we are usually asked for here

Postwar housing through Shepparton and Mooroopna commonly has thin original material or nothing at all, and the township housing at Tatura and Numurkah is older again and more likely to be bare. Where material does exist it has usually settled well below its rating, and the extreme heat cycling here accelerates that in a way it does not in Melbourne. The blockers are the newer estate development around Kialla and the northern edge of Shepparton falling out on construction age, and renovation work, which is markedly less widespread here than in metropolitan Melbourne and disqualifies far fewer properties as a result.