I have wondered about how useful thermal image surveys are, and how much you need to spend to get a camera that gives good informative results for building surveys and energy leakage. There seems to be a lot of contradictory information out there, and prices for thermal imaging cameras suitable for building applications vary from about £2500 up to £20,000. Howe much do you really need to spend ? I would be very interested to hear people's experiences and views on these.

You can start from £15 http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=220790

Found air infiltration all over the place and gaps in loft insulation without going up there using one of these.

Takes a long time, but gives me something to do while Casualty, Big Brother etc. are on.

I do a lot of thermal imaging professionaly (for the last 3/4 years or so).

My Camera is low res so I only do interior work and limited exterior detailing.

The main use is in conjunction with Ait leakage testing; Incoming cold air will cool sufraces showing up air leakage paths.

I am now about to upgrade and have found that £4,000-£8,000 is needed for a camaera capable of providing reasonable images for exterior work.

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It is very improtant to understant that thermal imaging is a qualitative analysis and needs a good understanding of physics to interpret correctly.
For instance if you image metal and wood at the same temperature the camera will show different temp's du to the different emissivities...

It is also a profession for insomniacs as Solar radiation quickly messes up results.

Visible light
IR

One option might be - get your self an old 35mm SLR, some Infrared film (which you need to sotre in the fridge for obvious reasons). You woin't be able to calcualte U values will need to learn how to set aperture and shutter speed manually but should get some "interesting" black and white IR pics. I think you can also get colour IR film - with the colours looking rather crazy!

Alternatively some of the digtal SLRs are available without the IR filter I believe - check some camera forums but it was what I was considering. I think some of the older models might be available cheaply on ebay having gone out of fashion. What you then need to add is a screw on visible light filter to the front of your SLR lens and all that hits the sensor is IR. So again - you can get black and white thermal images. White is hot - and leaky - darker is cooler and insulated. The advantage with digital of course is you can play with the settings to get the exposure right so that instead of getting a black image with shadesof dark grey, you get a whiter image with shades of light grey. You can also use the camera for "normal" photography. Still expect to spend a few bob on lenses, batteries, filters tripod / bag etc.

These both won't give you temperature reading and let you work out real U values, but at least you can see where the leaks are. They are also much higher resolution that dedicated IR cameras.

The thermal imaging of a house is really worth doing. The cameras are very expensive (>10k£), the good ones have Germanium lenses and are not sold to the general public (they are restricted). I tried making my own using a web cam and removing the IR filter, this hardly worked at all. I would guess minimum resolution to have now would be VGA 640X480.

It is well worth getting a surveyor round who offers an IR service. I paid £250 and it showed up all the places where radiators were streaming heat to outside. The wood framing of the house underneath the render. Places where water was leaking in from the roof and many other useful bits of information. The JPEGs supplied will be invaluable for future maintenance.

There are some things that would be a very useful addition. It would be useful to have a picture of where heat flows out of the house rather than the external temperature. Not quite sure how to achieve this (pulse heat the house?). Even better would be a service like IR that detected water or damp in buildings (in 3D). The person to lick that problem with a cheap gadget will make a fortune.

From my page: http://www.earth.org.uk/superinsulating-our-living-room.html

Livingston was very helpful 2010/07/19 saying that a typical low-end thermal camera with a USB connection to extract images from it would cost somewhere round £300--£400 for a 3-day hire which could be over a weekend, which would probably cover me. Ashtead Technology had a 2-day minimum hire for a little over £100/day for similar, so getting hold of this equipment is not prohibitively expensive or difficult.

Rgds

Damon

Get in touch with your local council energy efficency officer or The energy savings trust I was going to borrow one from a cheshire based charity, the rate of hire was to be £10 a week with £100 deposit.

the Transition movement might also be able to help.

if you reply to me quietly I will find exact contact info ,

arny

Not going to help much with the back or insides of houses, though a thermal overlay on Google Maps in mid-winter might be very very helpful, especially if updated annually.

Rgds

Damon

Much as I like the idea of Google Thermal Streetview, I am not sure it is technically feasible.

Someone with experience of heat cameras please tell us - do they record images fast enough to be used from a moving car? The cops use infra red cameras from helicopters to pursue suspects by night - but maybe that's a different kind of camera.

Just had a quote to have a TI survey done of the house - £500 Thinking of popping round to the fire station and seeing if I can borrow theirs!

So does anyone know if this is a job that's fairly straight forward to DIY or does it need a "pro" to interpret properly.

TIC hire is about £200 (cheaper if you have a trade desk nearby and can do 1 day hire) but the cheapest quote to do a TIC only survey is about £300+vat and a blower door is £500-600

I think that "infrared scanner" just means that they use an infra red laser (LED) to scan objects to determine distance etc., but I could be wrong. Oh, erm, Bra Boy, those are just rumours. You can't prove anything...
Brian.

Yes, never thought it may be a 'bar code reader' or for some users a 'bra' code reader.

daysleeper - see PaulT's post dated Jan 14th 2009, above.

I had a free trial from fluke for a couple of days, it was interesting too see the differences in the recently insulated rafters in one room and the original non insulated rafters.

Go to fluke website, i think its called try and buy, i didnt buy.

Tonyt