Thermal Imaging Inspection in Lisboa

About our service in Lisboa

Lisbon has a housing stock in which almost nothing stayed as it was built. A Pombaline block in the Baixa, a tenement in Graça or Arroios and a tower in the Avenidas Novas have all been through successive refurbishments, with pipework rerouted, false ceilings added and walls lined over whatever was already there. When a patch appears on a ceiling or a skirting board starts to bow, the visible point is the end of the journey and not the start of it. A thermal camera reads surface temperature and reveals areas that are colder, because water is evaporating, or warmer, where hot water is running. That contrast draws the likely path of the water and shows where it is worth opening up, and above all where it is not. A useful inspection begins before the camera comes out of the case. We ask how long the patch has been there, whether it worsens with rain or with everyday use of the flat, what work has been done and what is going on in the flat above. Then we set the conditions up: heating running, hot water circulating, windows kept shut for a while, the suspect run put under pressure. Only then do we work across walls, ceilings and floors, comparing the thermal image with the ordinary photograph in the same framing. Every suspicion is confirmed with a contact moisture meter, because a cold area can just as easily be a draught through a window junction. It is worth saying what thermography does not do. It needs a temperature difference between surfaces to reveal anything at all: on a warm day, with the flat and the street at much the same temperature, the image comes out flat and tells us very little, and in those cases we book first thing in the morning or arrange for the home to be heated beforehand. The camera does not see through walls; it reads what happens at the surface and lets us infer the rest. When doubt remains, we say that opening up at one point is still needed, instead of asserting what we cannot prove. Nor do we issue regulatory habitability assessments: what we hand over is a technical survey with images.

A thermographic inspection in Lisbon covers:

Services Included

• Locating the source of damp patches on ceilings and walls
• Detecting leaks in concealed pipework without breaking into finishes
• Surveying thermal bridges and heat loss ahead of refurbishment work
• Checking consumer units and electrical circuits for abnormal hot spots
• Written report with thermal images for the building management, seller or insurer

Areas We Serve

We work right across the city: Baixa, Chiado, Avenidas Novas, Estrela, Areeiro, Graça, Arroios and Campolide, in buildings with and without a lift.

Work Gallery