Information for SuperHeat users

Links to Regulations and Approved Documents

The England and Waless Part L Approved Documents can be downloaded from the ODPM web site. See DTLR Circular 03/2001 and Circular 03/2001 Annex D for a summary of the Part L changes, also the BRE Part L FAQ (frequently asked questions) page. The current Part L took effect on 1 April 2002.

In Scotland the corresponding new Part J came into effect on 4 March 2002. Scottish Executive. (Scottish Building Standards Agency home page). Part J was replaced by Technical Handbook 6 in April 2005. This can be downloaded from the SBSA website.

DTLR "circular letter" - 12 February 2002 authorises SAP 2001 as an approved method for producing energy ratings. The SAP 2001 document can be downloaded from the BRECSU web site.

SuperHeat 5.1 has been approved by BRE for the purposes of producing SAP Ratings using SAP-2001. Download SAP-2001 Manual

STOP PRESS: The ODPM have issueda further amendment to the L1 Approved Document. This effectively reverses most of the changes in the ill-fated 1 April 2005 amendment, requiring only that gas and oil boilers have a minimum SEDBUK efficiency 86% and 85% respectively.

Future changes
SuperHeat 6 is in development

LATEST NEWS: New draft Part L Approved Documents were published by ODPM on Sept 13 2005. News Release and link to downloadable copies. An almost complete version of SAP 2005 (published Oct 19 2005) is available at www.bre.co.uk/sap2005

We are currently working on SuperHeat 6 which will be based on these new documents and hope to release it in early 2006 - copies will be sent to all SuperHeat 5 users with current update cover. SuperHeat 6 will not include any checking of buildings other than dwellings. A free program for checking such buildings, iSBEM, will be available from the BRE website

Regulations requiring boilers to have a minimum efficiency of 86% (effectively allowing the installation of condensing boilers only) came into force on April 1st 2005. This requirement do not apply where it is impracticable to install a condensing boiler. ODPM Part L page

SEDBUK boiler database

The SEDBUK boiler database giving seasonal efficiency figures for the vast majority of current boilers is available on the web at www.sedbuk.com. SuperHeat 5 includes SEDBUK database support. If you are calculating the SAP rating for a dwelling where you know the exact boiler make and model you will be able to use this information to calculate a more accurate (and generally higher) SAP Rating. Our free QSEDBUK boiler database browser makes it easy to select the most efficient boilers of any particular type.

Factors affecting SAP Ratings

How do you increase the SAP Rating of a dwelling? Adding loft insulation doesn't seem to have much effect. Check out this page for more information.

Extend your knowledge:

• Factors affecting SAP ratings: for users of SuperHeat 5
• The Energy Saving Trust web site
• EnerGuide: How they do things in Canada
• .... and Australia The Australian Greenhouse Office
• Thermal stores explained in simple language: From the U.K. D-I-Y Frequently Asked Questions pages
• Domestic Hot Water: A Specifier's Guide: From the Copper Development Association Web Site.
• Honeywell heating control application guides: free downloads in PDF format

Release 5.10l: 1 December 2005

Users of 5.00a or later who have been sent and entered a valid activation key ending in 512 or greater can download this release using the Miscellaneous, Check SDA Website for Updates option within the program. How to use the web updates facility. You can only download this update from an existing copy of SuperHeat 5 .

1. We have reinstated the ability to reposition (by dragging row numbers up and down) materials within the Element of Construction edit dialog
2. You can now change the height of the Element of Construction edit dialog - increasing it shows more rows in the material table
3. The options on the Internet menu - Visit the SDA website, update SEDBUK boiler database and Check SDA website for updates - can now be disabled if desired. Please contact us if you need to know how to do this.

Release 5.10k: 27 October 2005

• We have made a number of visual changes to SuperHeat - better quality toolbar images, new data entry tables etc.
• On the Element of Construction edit dialog, materials providing alternate heat paths are now grouped by checking a box below the table rather than check boxes in the table.
• If you entered a roof with insulation between rafters and a user-defined U-value of 0.20 this was shown as not complying with Elemental provisions due to a very small rounding error - fixed
• The maximum width for horizontal edge insulation that can be entered in the Ground Floor Edit dialog is now 1500mm (as per Appendix C tables)
• When checking to Scottish requirements references are now to the new Technical Handbook 6 provisions rather than Part J
• The Configuration, Screen colours dialog has been redesigned to allow quicker colour selection
• An additional preference 'Ask before closing program' has been added to the Configuration, User Setup dialog Preferences page. If the box is checked you get the 'Exit Yes/No' confirmation dialog; if you uncheck the box this is skipped, though you will continue to be asked whether you wish to save any unsaved work.
• 5.10h introduced a bug that stopped the SEDBUK database being updated - fixed in 5.10i; 5.10j fixes a bug in 5.10h/i that stopped rooflights being added.
• 5.10k fixes the following:
  1. Entering rooflight area as an expression triggered error dialog - fixed
  2. Overriding rooflight U-value could cause AV error - fixed
  3. Element numbers (e.g. Window 1) sometimes omitted from windows - fixed
  4. Wrong icons shown on roof and floor windows - fixed

Release 5.10g: 13 December 2004

1. Bug fixed that caused error message to be displayed with heating system #1067 (direct-acting electric boiler)
2. Bug fixed that left toolbar report buttons active with no building file loaded
3. Bugs fixed that could leave toolbar Edit button disabled when you selected a wall, floor or roof from the Project Manager
4. The toolbar and Project Manager fonts can now be changed from within the Configuration, Screen and Printer fonts dialog.

Release 5.10f: 20 October 2004

1. Where a dwelling included a semi-exposed wall containing one or more windows these windows were shown as providing a solar gain, but this was not included in the solar gains figure at box 65 on the SAP Rating worksheet. This has been fixed: now the total on the solar gains report is always the same as the figure used in box 65. These openings were also omitted from the Elemental Report - now fixed.
   The most common situation of a window in a semi-exposed wall will be one in a wall separating a house from an unheated conservatory, where the solar gain should be taken as if there were no conservatory (SAP 2001 3.3.3.1. If you have an opening in a semi-exposed wall where there will be no gain (e.g. a window in a wall separating a dwelling from an unheated store) you can now select a solar access factor of 0.0
2. The Material Edit dialog now has two radio buttons for selecting Total Resistance or Resistivity instead of a button whose caption toggled between these two each time you pressed it.
3. Change made to overcome occasional 'Could not create backup' error messages which stopped the project being saved under its current name.
4. Tile Reports button stopped working in 5.10e - fixed

Release 5.10e: 8 September 2004

1. Target U-value method:(not NI): We managed to miss a change introduced in 2002 that now treats semi-exposed walls and floors as exposed elements when calculating the target U-value. We have now corrected this. In most cases this will make no difference, though at the margin a dwelling containing semi-exposed walls or floors may now comply where it was previously shown as failing or vice-versa.
2. The semi-exposed wall/floor U-value adjustment factor was only saved with one decimal place instead of two, so saving and reloading a building could return a different value - fixed
3. The Miscellaneous, File Catalogue option now immediately displays a list of building files with an 'Open' button next to each file name. Press the 'Change' button at the top of the list to change the file mask
4. Small bug fixed that could cause an access violation error on closing the program

Release 5.10d: 11 June 2004

1. The '0.04x' was omitted from the solar gain adjustment formula printed on the Target U-value report, though this factor was used in calculating the result which was printed correctly
2. On the Solar Gains report repeated indentical descriptions are replaced by 'do.'
3. Non UK users only: If you are using the program in a country where the thousands and decimal separators are not ',' and '.' the program now works correctly - use your own native separators when entering data (on much of mainland Europe 2,345.67 would be entered as 2.345,67). Reports are output using UK formatting on the assumption that the ultimate recipient is likely to be in the UK

Release 5.10c: 27 March 2004

A number of minor changes and fixes, some replicating changes already made in SuperBeam and ProSteel. Key changes:

1. If the building type was a domestic extension, the floor area was lost on saving - fixed
2. You can now change the display font size by holding down the Alt key and pressing the numeric keypad Plus or Minus keys
3. The calculator now includes keys to recall the last expression ('#') and to calculate VAT (at 17.5%) on the last result or current entry.
4. An alternative way of numbering pages has been added: the Print dialog now offers you two options: Sequential numbering (1,2,3...) as before, with the first number selectable by the user; or 'Number by content'. If you choose the latter, pages are given the same number as the report (1: U-values; 7: SAP worksheet etc), with a second number for subpages, e.g. SAP Rating worksheet pages will always be numbered 7.1, 7.2 regardless of what else you print
5. By design calculated field entries ignore extraneous text which may clarify an expression - e.g 'avg' or 'est'. To save risks of errors being introduced, any instances of upper case 'O' are now flagged as an error, before 2O would be interpreted as 2, not 20.
6. If you select a font size for the toolbar buttons that would push the rightmost buttons out of sight the font size is reduced until all the buttons are visible (where possible)
7. An asterisk at the end of the program title bar after the file name indicates that changes have been made since the data was last saved (replicating the red marker on the status bar)