Under the Roofline: How Concrete Ring Beams Perform in Galway and Mayo Builds.

IMAGE: Concrete ring beam cast over a Galway home.

A concrete ring beam is a piece of cast concrete that is put in place just under your roof, to mak your structure solid. It runs horizontally around your house, at the top of the external walls for the entire perimeter of the structure. Historically, you would find them included in houses built in the 1950-1980’s and also with the reconstruction of stone wall cottages, to regularise the top of uneven stone wall. A Concrete Ring Beam helps to stabilise a structure, to better resist/distribute roof loads over them.

Is there a concrete ring beam in my house in Galway or Mayo?

If your house was built using traditional methods from the mid- 1950’s to the early- 1980’s, then the answer is “Yes, probably”. An engineering surveyor, for example the team at mypropertysurvey.ie will carry out a thermal imaging survey of your property and using the results and their many years of experience they can advise if your house includes a concrete ring beam.

Is discovering a concrete ring beam bad news for homeowners? In short – no. It ties your walls together; it distributes roof loads and when executed well it prevents structural cracking. However, it can contribute to a thing called “Cold-Bridge”, and this can be bad for thermal performance of the wall.

What is Cold Bridge?

A cold bridge (also called a thermal bridge) is a localised area of ‘cold’ in a building's envelope that has significantly higher thermal conductivity than the surrounding insulated materials. In short, cold from outside can travel along this material to inside and cause a “cold bridge”.

Heat naturally travels along the path of least resistance. When insulation is interrupted by a material that conducts heat easily—such as concrete, steel, uninsulated lintels, or mortar—heat escapes rapidly outward in winter (or enters in summer).

IMAGE: Thermal imager shows “cold Bridge” under a roof in Mayo home. The cold bridge is the purple colour.

Do concrete ring beams pose any other problems for homeowners in Galway and Mayo?

By and large, no – there is no need to assume that just because you have a concrete ring beam your house is deficient in any way. Depending on how it was constructed, the concrete ring beam may present issues with cold-bridging that in severe cases can be susceptible to moisture, dampness and mould growth. However, if you insulate the inside face of your external walls (often called “dry-lining”) the issue can be resolved quickly and cleanly with no adverse effects.

And after that? Very little – the team at mypropertysurvey.ie are available to provide advice and offer suggestions but otherwise relax and get back to enjoying day-to-day life in your home.