Making a conservatory habitable?

[bigbadbarry]

We are rearranging our downstairs and I have a fancy to move the dining room into the conservatory. It is one of those typical useless conservatories, currently serving as a repository for the kids' crafting crap because it doesn't get above 3 degrees in the winter or below 30 in the summer. Very pleasant for a week and a half in April. In principle, I believe this is possible to fix - new roof (solid or solar glass?) which might knock-on to fiddling with t he walls in terms of support; digging up and insulating the solid concrete floor; putting in some sort of heating. But has anybody actually done this with any degree of success? All success or horror stories gratefully received.

We have solar glass roof and windows in ours. We can use it all year round - even on the very hot days this summer with the windows open it was not too hot to sit in. Would defo recommend.

Thanks. Was it built like that or did you have an antiquated useless one renovated?

We have a useless conservatory too. It is North facing, has a plastic roof, and flimsy doors to the (unheated) kitchen so acts as an oven in summer and a cooling plant from autumn to spring.

We're getting quotes this week for better internal doors (so at the least it keeps its temperature problems to itself) and a replacement roof.

my understanding is for a glass roof you need walls on three sides, but I'll find out for sure on Friday!

It is 2 years old but the glass is just ordinary glass. The solar stuff is a special film that they apply later. It is slightly blue tinged on the roof and slightly sepia tinged on the windows but you can't really see it. Our conservatory faces south, too, so it must be good stuff.

We replaced our conservatory with a solar glass one and it works pretty well. You can get a special film fitted to normal glass as an alternative and that works on the same principles as I understand it. We got a quote for that and I think it was around £500 to get it fitted to the roof. (Large-ish conservatory, 5m*4m, around 7 years ago).
Don't know what you have on the floor, but I would go for a wooden one with some insulation underneath. We have a radiator in our conservatory and that keeps it warm enough on all but the coldest nights. Electric underfloor heating would work well, but can be expensive to run.

Eeyore, if you could come back and update after Friday that would be great! I have walls on 2 sides and glass on 2 sides.
I really don't want to have to knock it down and rebuild: if it comes to that then the project will be off, I think. Digging up the uninsulated floor and laying something more sensible will be essential, and we don't want to pour heat into the garden.

coming back to report :)

we can replace the horrible roof plastic with glass. they'd use Pilkingtons active k self clean, and would need to replace the roof frame as well as the glass. But everything else can stay the same. we'd be looking at about £4k.

One guy also suggested we replace all the panes (including the 'walls') to boost efficiency. That would only be another £500.

I have underfloor hearing (electric) and wouldn't recommend it. It takes the edge off, but that is it. But love my glass roof!

Thanks Eeyore (and Jeni). That sounds very reasonable.

We had one of these, huge south facing conservatory which we used as a dining room March - October, but was useless in winter unless you were prepared to spend serious money on heating it - 3 electric radiators barely touched it..... We looked at having it upgraded but supportive uprights wouldn't take the weight of a glass roof, so we probed further and in the end realised that if we had the supports rebuilt, the plastic roof replaced with glass, the floor dug up and underfloor heating put in, it would cost serious amounts of money. So we went for the "knock it down and replace with a proper room" option, which i haven't regretted for a second. We got several quote and advice about what to do, and to upgrade / replace the conservatory with better glass etc was going to cost about £20k, so building a proper room, which will be so much better in the long term, was a bit of a no-brainer. It dies depend on your budget though.

Our conservatory is exclusively for plants - I have a chair in there but it always has a watering can on it.

When I designed it, the plan was always to put full double glazed units on the ceiling and walls as then its silent when it rains, the temperature stays stable and its lovely and bright.
It has a radiator in there - so that the next owners of the house can use it as a normal room.

if you possibly can, get the glazing upgraded as high as you can because then you save money heating it, you enjoy it, and when you do move its a bonus not a drag.