Following the advertisement at reference 1, the first campaign in the roof has now been concluded.
The material chosen was 'Knauf Insulation: Loft Roll 44 Combi Cut: 12,180 x 1,140 x 100mm', stuff which looked rather like the bio-degradable stuff that Neal's Yard use to insulation cheese for home delivery, the same Jacobs' sheep medley of colours. The same sort of light felting of the fibres. But hopefully quite different.
I didn't make a very good job at estimating the quantity, finding that I had enough for two layers, perhaps no bad thing, but not what was at first intended. To be fair, not helped by their being some confusion about whether the rolls were 12m or 8m long. And some customer feedback complaining that coverage was actually only about one half of the nominal coverage.
The equipment chosen is mostly snapped above. Substantial knee pads to strap over trousers. Absolutely essential as far as I was concerned, clambering around the roof on all fours being hard on the older knee.
A substantial knife, once owned by the naval uncle, but no idea what it was originally intended for. Five and a half inches by one and a half inch blade, exclusive of handle. Blade properly tapered front to back, a sixteenth of an inch back, quite sharp front. A tool which one can get a good positive grip on and which cut through the insulation when sandwiched between a plank and a corresponding length of three by two very satisfactorily. Much better than fiddling about in the dark with one of those (Stanley) craft knives suggested by YouTube, although I do have one of those too.
The only downside was its dark colouring, which meant that I was forever putting it down and not being able to find it. Luminous paint on the blade? Homing chip in the handle?
Gloves worn more or less the whole time. Partly because my hands are quite soft these days, partly because insulating rolls do irritate - although this stuff was not nearly as bad in that respect as the orange stuff I last used, maybe thirty years ago now. The NHS face mask worked well at keeping the dust out, but also left me a bit short of breath.
Plus my trusty decorator's boat, also more than thirty years old now, to carry the tools in. At least what I call a decorator's boat - but not a usage recognised by either Bing or Google.
Work so far done in two phases. First, just the one run to get the feel of things. Took a break of a couple of days to ponder about method and technique. As a beginner, I thought that this was well worth while. Second, the big push, spread over three consecutive days. Leaving just the second layer for the first run, laid before the second layer was invented.
One lesson was to be flexible as to cutting and laying method. Our roof is an awkward shape, something close to a square with a large corner taken out. Then there are a couple of chimneys and the water tanks. Then there is the boarding over about a third of the area. All a bit more fiddly than running out one roll after another.
Another lesson was that one was covering up most of the rafters and one could no longer walk on them once they were covered up. Some thought needed to be given to the order of doing things. Do not paint yourself into a corner!
Another lesson was that I was unconvinced about these large rolls, nearly cut into two fat and two thin strips, the 'Combi cut' of the product name. It had its points, but I think next time I will settle for much narrower rolls without the cuts, something more like that snapped above. Easy of handling will more than compensate for having more of it. Bearing in mind, that if I were placing the insulation between the rafters rather than on the rafters, their spacing is fairly uneven. Not like a modern roof at all.
Time to put the thinking cap on to decide what to do about the two water tanks, which will now be much colder when it is cold. Perhaps, as things stand, apt to freeze, despite their current insulation.
References
Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/09/heritage-diy.html.
Reference 2: https://knauf.com/en.
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