Part F Building Regulations

What are Part F Building Regulations?

Part F building regulations cover every building regulation concerning ventilation. Last updated in 2010, part F ensures there’s adequate ventilation for people in a building, ventilation being the removal of stale air from a building and replacement with fresh outside air.

The Building Regulations Part F say the air flow in all mechanical ventilation systems must be measured on site, even simple things cooker extractor fans. And home buyers must be given full information about their system, including recommendations for maintenance.

Why? It’s all about meeting Britain’s carbon target, to achieve zero carbon homes by 2016. Luckily our systems help with SAP Ratings and Energy Performance Certificates on new builds, making your life much easier.

Part F Building Regulations: A Guide

The UK building regulations ventilation requirements were created to make sure homeowners get the very best out of their ventilation systems. They look at three main areas:

1. Extraction ventilation – where condensation or pollutants are extracted mechanically
2. Whole building ventilation – which delivers fresh air and disperses pollution via air exchange through trickle vents, AKA background ventilators
3. Purge ventilation – where large amounts of vapour and pollutants are removed and thermal comfort is improved

Part F ventilation regulations cover domestic ventilation compliance, air permeability, installation & commissioning and ventilation control.

• Domestic Ventilation Compliance – English building regulations specify installation guidelines for all major ventilation systems in fine detail, including checklists for declaring the equipment, its performance and commissioning, which have to be submitted to the relevant building control body to meet planning regulations.
• Air permeability – New homes are built to be airtight, to save energy and lower carbon emissions. The latest building regulations mean ventilation systems have had to change too, designed to increase and improve the flow of air through these new, extra-airtight buildings.
• Installation and commissioning – Part F construction regulations also looks at commissioning and installing ventilation systems correctly, as well as post-installation testing. This is to help builders and developers avoid issues like dangerous wiring and insufficient access space.
• Ventilation control – British building regulations go into some detail about system control, things like the right height door undercuts and the degree to which windows must open. While they might seem fiddly, together they make sure new builds are properly ventilated, safe, healthy and comfortable.
• Appendix Q – Our systems all meet Appendix Q requirements, which simply means they’re listed in the software that an Energy Assessor is qualified to use. All our MVHR units and systems comply with Appendix Q.
• Trickle vents building regulations – The ventilation building regulations say replacement windows should either include trickle ventilators or an equivalent opening in the same room. And all new builds must have them. But if there were no trickle vents in the original windows, there’s no need to include them in replacement windows.

Contact us – We always comply with Part F

Everything we do complies fully with Part F. If you want to get involved with the technical side of your MVHR project, we’ll be delighted to explain the technical, legal and fine detail. Otherwise you can leave it to us to get it right on your behalf first time, every time.

Simply upload your architectural design or plans in CAD .dwg format or as a .pdf. As far as the technical, legal and fine detail is concerned, we’ll ensure the system we specify meets all current Part F regulations.