Using bending springs is a simple job which requires little practice to achieve successful results. The spring should be inserted into the pipe so that the middle of the spring roughly corresponds with the proposed bend point. If this means that the spring will disappear into the pipe, attach a length of nylon cord or thick string to help you remove it after the bend has been made. In many cases the easiest way to make the bend is to place the pipe, with the spring inserted, just below your kneecap and, holding it either side, gently pull it towards you.

As it is difficult to correct a greatly overbent pipe by this method, first underbend and then check the angle before proceeding. If the pipe proves too tough to bend this way, obtain a thick piece of wood, about l00mm x 50mm and about 610 mm long, and drill a hole near one end slightly larger than the diameter of the pipe. Chamfer the lower edges of this hole with a suitable tool (the round file will do). Then place the bottom of the wood on,the floor or workbench, insert the pipe in the hole, and then press down on either side. When the bend has been completed, the spring is sometimes difficult to withdraw. This can be overcome in two ways. The first is to insert a screwdriver through the eye at the top of the spring and unscrew it anti-clockwise. The other method is to overbend the pipe slightly, then correct. This loosens the ‘grip’and the spring can then be pulled out.

If you are using a vice to hold the pipe steady, wrap a thick piece of cloth around the pipe to protect it from damage. Another method is to hold the pipe on top of your left foot (if you are right handed) to steady it while cutting. This method enables you to cut the pipe where you are working and so avoids frequent journeys to the workbench. But you need a straight eye ! When using the hacksaw, use only gentle and even pressure and take care to make a straight cut-a crooked one will impede good joint making later. Stainless-steel pipes are much tougher than copper and more pressure is needed to cut them with a hacksaw. A pipe cutter has the advantage of producing a straight, clean cut more easily than a hacksaw.

A typical one has three toughened metal .wheels mounted on a frame to form a triangle. The circumference of each is tapered to form a cutting edge and a threaded spindle is attached to one of the wheels for adjustment. To cut the pipe, insert it between the wheels and position them over the cutting point. Adjust the cutters so that they grip and turn the tool a couple of times round the pipe. Then tighten the spindle to deepen the cut and continue turning, re-tightening as you go, until the pipe is severed. Once the cut has been made, the burrs, or jagged edges, left inside and outside the pipe end must be removed. If they are left, they can restrict the water flow and create unwanted turbulence within the pipe. They can also make the actual jointing of the pipes much more difficult, if not impossible, particularly where capillary fittings are used. To remove them, use the flat file to clean off the external edge, and the round file for the inside. Many pipe cutters have an accessory for this. Also bevel the outside edges of the pipe slightly with the flat file as this will enable the pipe to fit tightly inside the fitting.

Insulating the loft door is effective, but in cold climates it makes the loft itself very cold indeed. Little of the the heat used to penetrate can now do so. If the cold water cistern is up there, as it is in most British houses, you will have to lag it , wrap it up to stop it freezing in the winter. Leave a space in the floor insulation under the cistern so that a little heat reaches it from below.

The cistern itself can be lagged with various materials. A special type of fibreglass blanket is sold for the purpose. There are tank lagging kits available that use cut-to size insulation boards to fit all standard sizes of cistern. The boards fasten together with clips that are supplied with the kit. Holes can be cut for the cistern’s pipes with a handyman’s knife.

Measure the exact position of the hole from the two nearest edges with a ruler. Cut as small and neat a hole as possible, and cut out a strip of board from the hole to the edge of the board so that you can slide the board into place over the pipe. When the board is in position, put the strip back and clip it down. Join the edges of the floor insulation to the sides of the tank insulation so that no heat seeps through the gap.

There is a tendency among builders to skimp on the insulation that they should be installing in every new house, but you can remedy this in your own home at a cost of a few pounds. Proper heat insulation is a ‘must’ in any climate from the Arctic to the tropics-in cold weather it keeps the interior of the house warm, and in hot weather it keeps it cool. If you live in an average British semidetached house with central heating you may be wasting as much as three-quarters of your fuel in heating the air outside your house. It has been estimated that in a house of this type, only 25 % of the heat produced goes to heat the rooms. Of the rest of the heat, 25% goes through the outside walls, 20& through the roof, 20% through windows, doors and chimneys, and 10% through the ground floor. In a terrace house, slightly less heat is wasted than this, and in a detached one, slightly more. In a modern house with large windows, even more heat may be lost.

In any case the annual waste of money is enormous. In a hot climate, of course, the problem is quite the reverse -to stop the sun that beats down on the roof from making the house interior too hot. In some countries. there has been a trend since the Second World War to make roof pitches (slopes) lower and lower sometimes as little as l6 degrees. This reduces the volume of air available as ‘insulation’ between roof and ceiling, and helps make the running of an air conditioning system more expensive than it would otherwise be. The answer to both problems is efficient insulation. Insulating a house properly can reduce heating bills by 35% while keeping the rooms at the same temperature, or can make the house much warmer without using more fuel. Similarly, insulation can reduce substantially the power consumption of an air conditioning system,or, in a moderately warm climate, even make one unnecessary. The greatest fuel savings made by insulation are in houses with central heating. Provided the insulation is done economically, it should pay for it self in two years’ saving on fuel bills. In houses with local heating, such as electric fireplaces or gas fires, people tend to heat only the rooms they use most, and the saving is not so great. But insulation will still make the house more comfortable. Many postwar British houses have a certain amount of insulating material already installed. But standards are not very high as a rule, and adding more insulation is generally worthwhile.

Value for money
An important factor in deciding whether insulation is worthwhile or not is, of course, the cost of installing it. For example, salesmen of double glazing windows and doors often clainr that their glazing halves the heat loss through windows. This sounds impressive until you realise what a small proportion of the total area of a house the windows occupy. Halving the heat loss through them might reduce heating bills by cornparatively little. If this is the case, then obviously it would be better to spend the money elsewhere. Before installing one type ol insulation rather than another, it is a good idea to find out the relative costs ol various n-rethods of insulation, and how ellcient they are. The efficiency of an insulating material is expressed as a’U value’, and the brochures put out by insulating-material manufacturers generally state the improvement in U value obtained by using their material.

U value measures the amount of heat that passes through a material in a given time, so a high U value is undesirable and a low U value is desirable. For example, a properly-insulated lolt floor may have a U value as low as 0.08. If it is not insulated at all, the U value averages 0.43 in post-war houses. The U values quoted by manufacturers for their products are average figures for houses in normal positions. If your house is in a very exposed position, such as on a hill or overlooking the sea, the U value of even the best insulation will be raised, and therefore worsened, by the winds whistling around your roof and walls. You will need more and better insulation. Similarly, if your house is in a sheltered valley and surrounded by trees, you will not need so much insulation to keep it warm-though in fact the more insulation you have, the more heat you save.