My interest in the history of the Uniseco started when I moved to one in Suffolk.

Some 160,000 prefabs were built and erected between 1944 and 1949 as a result of the 1944 Housing (Temporary Accommodation) Act. They were designed to provide a quick solution to the massive shortage of housing caused by the destruction of so many buildings during WWII. At the time they provided up to date and modern accommodation, with indoor WC, running hot water, bathroom, fitted stove, and a garden. Prefabs marked a real improvement on the pre-war accommodation for most families. Most, if not all, also provided built-in storage/cupboards.

Principal models were the Arcon, B2, Phoenix, Tarran, Uniseco and Universal. The intention was for them to cost £500 each but the actual cost was closer to £1300.

All proposals for designs to be considered under the scheme had to satisfy a range of criteria regarding their materials, size and manufacture. They all had to make use of a government approved plumbing unit for the back to back kitchen and bathroom and had to allow for transport by road, so none of the individual components could have a width greater than 7′ 6″. All were designed to the same size, with a floor area of 635 square feet, and had the same basic two bedroom layout. They had to be relatively easy to construct and erect as skilled labour was in short supply during and after the war. Many were built by prisoners of war.

They were expected to last 5 to 10 years, but I can remember estates of prefabs still standing in the sixties and seventies in rural Essex. There are some prefabs standing even now, though many sites and individual properties have been cleared and redeveloped. Some are now in museums such as St Fagans, Wales, some such as those in Hall Green, Birmingham have achieved listing status. Many others have been proposed for listing but there is little current information available as to whether any of these succeeded and will be preserved as part of our heritage.

The Uniseco was produced by Selection Engineering Company Ltd. The UniSeco Mark 2 types have a side entrance, Mark 3 have a central entrance with a central hall.

General construction was quite simple. A timber cill was fixed to the perimeter of a concrete ground slab. Storey height wall panels and tongue and groove floor panels were then fitted onto this cill. Panel joints were tongue and groove, though I have not been able to discover whether these were machined tongues or loose and fitted into machined slots on site. The external wall panels consisted of a timber frame covered each side with an asbestos cement sheet and filled with wood wool which bonds the sheets together. The abutted sheets formed a ‘v’ groove filled with Secomastic and covered with asbestos strip externally giving the Uniseco its distinctive appearance. It was said that the walls performed better thermally than 9 and even 13 inch brickwork – which seems to be true according to a quick u-value calculation.

The roof was of a very low pitch and made of panels similar to those of the walls, laid on slightly tapered beams spanning from a central spine wall to the two longer outside walls and finished with typical hot bitumen felt.

The windows were of a standard Crittall type metal frame in timber surrounds.

My Uniseco

I initially thought my was a Tarran but the windows identify it as a Uniseco. The Uniseco has equal sized corner windows whereas the Tarran has a smaller widow to the end elevation.

I know little of its history but have been told by a neighbour that ‘it was brought up from London on the back of a lorry’ in the early fifties. It has been enhanced with a single brick external skin and cavity around the original external walls and a pitched roof over the original almost flat roof panels. I have no information as to whether these were added during or after its initial erection.

The external walls and roof panels are as expected, two skins of 5mm asbestos cement sheet with a 38mm woodwool core. The internal walls appear to be hollow hardboard covered panels approximately 50mm thick. Ceilings are of 12mm fibreboard. The original windows have been replaced with uPVC double glazed units except for the kitchen which is enclosed by a small conservatory/sun room. The separate WC and bathroom have been combined to form a large bathroom, again no idea of the history of this.

Thanks to Npower’s offer of £1 a roll insulation from Build Centre earlier this year I have been able to insulate the roof space – a bit too late for this winter though.

The future

Sometime I would like to insulate the external walls internally, but that will have to be done in conjunction with a complete rewire and moving the incoming electrical supply. That will be quite an expensive upgrade, plus the cost of Building Regulations fees of course. At the moment my annual energy costs are low so potential  savings are not great.

The current grant system isn’t designed for non-standard properties such as this, tending to be supply and fix only, from a few chosen operators, who are unlikely to consider any works due to H&S concerns – and how much good is half an inch of latex foam stuck to the walls anyway?