Sounds like you're referring to ceramic "ladrillos huecos" which come in all shapes and sizes. Some pix here http://www.paredesdeladrillo.com/rep....asp?id_rep=14
Is that what you mean?

The LH7 is 240x115x70mm and is the usual one for interior partition walls but they also come in 90 and 110mm width. Which one you go for depends on the height of your wall and your bricklaying skills lol.
There are even bigger ones, as you can see (gran formato) but personally I wouldn't use them in this context...

Yep Thanks for that.
I think Gran formato was what i was talking about. But why not use them in this context? & then what context are they for?

Because IMHO their slenderness ratio is too great to be using in a freestanding wall. Most of the strength of a masonry wall comes from the bonds between courses and with a really big, slender element you have v little in the way of bond compared to size...just my opinion!

This is what I have in addition to the polystyrene blocks of insulation, as a second outer wall to my house. Is this not normal then? Surely houses aren't built now with just the breeze block outer wall?

Sorry Mitzy, not sure what you're saying you have?
The vast majority of new builds here in the south are now RC frames with masonry infill walls, which can be single skin or double skin. It matters not as long as the thermal insulation values stack up to comply with building regs. Termoarcilla blocks are very popular at the moment...

I described it at the head of the thread

Thermal block (breeze block like) exterior wall. Then 2.5 inch polystyrene sheets up against that. Then ladrillos about 3" thick. Thats my outside walls. Inside walls, some are breeze block type, and others are ladrillo

Being in your fifties is no excuse for not measuring in metric, even the UK changed in the early seventies.

You and all Mitzy.

Yes ..... but there again I don't care!
The whole of bloody europe changed to €, but it didn't stop us ignoring it

Yes what you have is one way of complying with the building regs, but not the only way. As I said, there are many, including single skin walls, as long as the thermal resistance figures etc stack up it matters not how you get to it. And the prescribed values differ throughout Spain because of the widely differing climatic conditions.

Hillybilly, are there similar thermal rules for windows?

In the UK I believe there are rules which limit the area of glass relative to floor area - are there any similar rules in Spain?

Yes there are rules like that.

For example, a bedroom must have windows (the glass area I presume) which equate to 10% of the floor area.


FYI - I think some time ago the building regs (for Valencia anyway) were put in the free beer.

I can see that but I was looking at the situation where you have too much glass not too little.

Even double glazed windows are probably less efficient that foamed walls so is there a limit to how much glass you can have.

I raised the question because I read an article about a house in the UK that had most walls made of glass and they had major problems getting permission to build like that because of the thermal inefficiency compared to conventional methods.

Yes, in calculating the thermal resistivity of a building you have to take into account the values for and areas of windows too...every surface that is in contact with the external world!
There is also a "reverse" calculation that has to be done to work out the "factor solar"...the heat absorption of a building through its windows and skylights etc. Again the allowable figures vary according to which climatic zone you're in.