Appraisal of methods for the in-situ evaluation of the thermal resistance of house components

Abstract

Three in-situ measurement methods (Non-Contact Temperature Measurement; Heat Flux Meter; and Visual Inspection) plus the Examination of Documents are appraised. All perform satisfactorily under New Zealand conditions, but only the Heat Flux Meter offer in-situ quantitative results. Eight houses, selected from a study of 80 new houses undertaken in the winters of 1982 and 1983 in the four main centres, are used as examples. The R-value is a function of insulant, design and installation and thus all three must be considered in the detection and correction of thermal anomalies.