Insulating and Air Sealing

[00:00:04] Speaker A: Welcome to the weekend warriors home improvement. [00:00:06] Speaker B: Show, built by bar lumber. When it comes to big or small projects around the home, Tony and Cory have got the know how and the answers to make your life just a bit easier. Here they are, your weekend warriors, Tony and Cory. So last week we talked about things to consider when buying an appliance. So this week in our series that Tony and I are referring to as the energy efficiency series, we're going to be touching on a subject called insulation and weatherization. It's probably one of the most important topics to discuss. We love talking about it, and it's one of those things that if you've ever lived through any sort of winter in a cold state, insulation and air ceiling is probably the number one thing on your mind, especially when you get that electric bill. [00:00:58] Speaker A: It's definitely something that you're thinking about when you're shopping for a new home. There are homes out there built in the late 18 hundreds, in the late 19 hundreds. Right early in the difference between the way they were insulated, the difference in code, what was expected of those homes, and the insulation value at that time is vastly different, and it continues to change, even today. [00:01:24] Speaker B: Yeah. There's new energy codes that go into effect almost yearly. They change the IRC codes, and different jurisdictions will adopt them at different times. But as we get to this point of the most energy efficient house you could think of. Right. And what they were back in the stone age days. [00:01:46] Speaker A: No comparison. [00:01:47] Speaker B: Yeah, there's zero comparison. And over the years, it has just gotten better and better and better. And there has been times over the years where it got worse, where they tried some things, they did some things, they threw it out there. Builders did it, or it was too complicated and it caused problems. So, for instance, in certain areas of the country, you'll see a lot of people using plastic, visqueen plastic behind all of the sheet rock. Well, in our area, we don't do that. [00:02:17] Speaker A: We don't do that today. [00:02:19] Speaker B: Here in other parts of the country, they do. [00:02:21] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, I've actually bought a house built in the late 19 hundreds. [00:02:27] Speaker B: Right. [00:02:28] Speaker A: Let's say 1994. And that was completely sheeted with black poly. [00:02:34] Speaker B: Yeah, it's weird. [00:02:34] Speaker A: The entire interior. Now we don't do that anymore. [00:02:37] Speaker B: Right. We stopped it. [00:02:38] Speaker A: But there was a time here when. [00:02:39] Speaker B: It was happening, there was a reason for it, and it depends on your climate. So here in the valley of the Pacific Northwest, where Tony and I live, we're in the Portland area of Oregon, and it's like a rainforest here. It is constantly raining. Our houses never dry out. So that plastic added that layer of moisture barrier defense, but you're just stopping it. You're trapping it. So they realized that was a bad idea to use that sort of thing here. So building codes change over the years is all we're trying to say. And it's just something we've come up with a list of things to consider. When you're looking at fixing up your old house as a DIY or you're building a new one, and they're drastically different new houses, you have to be up to a certain amount of code. Older houses, you just want to be comfortable. Right. You can't fully air seal and fully reinsulate an old house unless you tear it down to the bones, which that's not what we're talking about here. You can do that, but that's not what we're talking about today. [00:03:52] Speaker A: Since everybody is in sort of a different situation. Whether your home is newer, marginally old, or really old, your situation is going to be unique. So we're going to talk about a lot of different things. You might find things you should consider when you are looking at what is going on at your house and what you should do or can do to make it more energy efficient by adding, subtracting, changing. In some cases, you might be insulating a space for the first time, or you might be putting more on top or changing the way it's been done entirely. And there's always an opportunity to do something like that that can be a project of its own. Or you could mix that in with a remodel. If you're making a change to a room or some rooms, that's a great opportunity to update your insulation in those rooms. So, anyways, we're going to talk about a lot of different areas of the house, a lot of different types of insulation. Way things happen, what's good and what's not, what's expensive and what's less expensive. And that's kind of what the show is about today. [00:04:56] Speaker B: Yeah. So the very first thing on our list that we came up with, and it's probably right off of what you said, since everyone's situation is unique, you can do what's called an energy audit. Now, you can do this yourself, or there are companies that you can hire that will come out and do certain things like a blower door test or a duct blaster test. A door blower test. They literally seal off your entire house. They close all your windows. They close all your doors, and they put this huge fan they open your front door and they put a huge fan in there, and it sucks out all of the air in your whole house to a certain degree, of course. [00:05:36] Speaker A: Right. [00:05:37] Speaker B: And what it does is it measures, it has very sensitive equipment that it measures how many air exchanges per hour that your home has. And what I mean by that is how leaky is it? So it'll draw the air out, and then it measures how long it holds that pressure. And if it has to keep pulling more air out, it just measures that. So it'll really tell you how often air is leaking into your home. So if you've got holes all over your house or it's not insulated or air sealed properly, then you're going to be getting a ton of air exchanges per hour versus new houses. I think they're limited to five or six air exchanges per hour. Wow. And older houses can have upwards of 20. [00:06:23] Speaker A: And so just to break that down a little bit, if you seal off the door and put this big suction thing and it starts pulling the air out of your house, the air goes out. And then what happens is air will automatically replace that air from the least. [00:06:41] Speaker B: Path of least resistance. [00:06:42] Speaker A: And so what you'll find, folks, is that that path of least resistance is generally around where a door is installed, whether that's into your garage or out on the back patio, around where a window is installed. And you've got windows all over the house, around the access to the crawl space, which oftentimes is not properly sealed. It'll come in around light switches, outlets, light fixtures that are in the ceiling, fans that are in the ceiling. All of the holes in all of the walls are subject to the potential to leak air from whatever's on the other side of that wall. In this case, exterior walls is what would be the most important to you? Exterior doors, exterior windows, and that sort of thing. [00:07:33] Speaker B: Well, and you may find it odd that if you put that thing in the front door and it's drawing out air and you walk around and you feel cold air coming in through, say, an interior plug, you'll have a receptacle, and you'll feel cold air blowing right out of that receptacle. The reason is because inside of that wall, all of your electrical wiring is spider webbed out all over the place. There's holes drilled. Your electrician went crazy in there and just drilled holes everywhere to run his wire. Well, sometimes he drilled them through the top plate, sometimes he drilled them through the bottom plate. And if he drilled them through the bottom plate, down into your crawl space that is literally a half inch, three quarter, one inch diameter hole. Whatever they chose to drill down into an area that is cold. So it's sucking air right up from your crawl space and then right out through your electrical outlets. [00:08:27] Speaker A: In the summertime, it's hot. Yeah, because it's an unconditioned space. It's going to be the opposite of what you're creating inside the home depending on what time of year it is. [00:08:38] Speaker B: Now, when we're talking about building new, there is a lot of different things that you can do when building new. For instance, building a conditioned crawl space, that's highly recommended. But again, we're talking about remodels. So if you're going to do an energy audit and you're going to find all of these areas, that's really what it's about. You're getting an audit, they're going to tell you either you pay for it or you do it kind of yourself. You're just going to find out the most critical areas. And like Tony said, most of it's going to be in that exterior. [00:09:06] Speaker A: You know, these days a lot of contractors out there are coming along behind themselves after they've drilled holes and ran wire or pipe or whatever it is that they're doing, and they'll fill up that with expanding foam. That's happening a lot these days. Not all the time, but a lot. [00:09:25] Speaker B: But even ten years ago, nobody was doing it right. I mean, that one off builder that was doing it ten years ago, it was way ahead of the game. [00:09:33] Speaker A: Yeah. Again, it just goes to speak to the difference between all of the different houses out there. Your situation could be that of any of those that we've talked about. You just don't know. All you can do is your very best, and a blower door test is a good example. I'm a little concerned about the duck blaster. I feel like you need a stamp for that or something. [00:09:59] Speaker B: I don't know if you can actually rent a blower door test. I have no idea. I know you can hire companies to do it. I don't think you could just go do it yourself. In that case, maybe. [00:10:12] Speaker A: But a duck blaster, if you've got a shotgun. [00:10:14] Speaker B: Oh, a duck duck blaster, you're good to go. Twelve gauge, 20 gauge. Duct. Duct. [00:10:21] Speaker A: Oh, duct. I see, I misunderstood. [00:10:23] Speaker B: It's the same idea as the blower door test where they're putting that suction fan in the front door. What they do is they seal off your hvac system and then do the same thing. They suck all the air out and it tells them how leaky your hvac system is. [00:10:44] Speaker A: Okay. [00:10:45] Speaker B: Now, I would have found this very helpful with houses of mine that I've owned in the past where we are. [00:10:51] Speaker A: Getting no resistance at all. [00:10:53] Speaker B: Actually, zero. Yeah. [00:10:54] Speaker A: You have no resistance. [00:10:57] Speaker B: I had a house, my very first house that I bought, every single duct was almost laying on the ground in the crawl space. [00:11:04] Speaker A: That's a constant air change for you. [00:11:06] Speaker B: Awful. Tony got very dirty helping me. [00:11:11] Speaker A: That was a good time. That was a good project in that. [00:11:13] Speaker B: Good old twelve inch deep crawl space. [00:11:15] Speaker A: We got a lot done, though. [00:11:16] Speaker B: That's. Good lord. Another tip for doing an energy audit is to go rent a camera. An infrared camera. [00:11:23] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:11:24] Speaker B: What you do. Here's a tip. I've done this. It actually is amazing. You can fire on your furnace, let it warm up for a good hour, and then on a cool morning, walk outside with an infrared camera and walk around your house and look at the house and see where the heat is coming out. You see right where it's coming out? Yeah. [00:11:47] Speaker A: I mean, I actually was in a home with someone who owned one of those infrared cameras. But in the instance that I was at, it was cold outside and we were inside the house and you could see blue. All the areas where cold was coming in. It was a really bright blue on the camera. [00:12:08] Speaker B: That's a pretty cool thing to do. You can actually buy little attachments made by Flir, which is a local Oregon company. You can buy them, they click on your phone and it turns your phone into an infrared camera. Or you can just go rent them. You'll have a nice big one with a big screen on it and you can record. You can save the videos. You can email them to yourself. It's pretty handy to have. [00:12:31] Speaker A: Having infrared capability on your phone would be pretty cool. [00:12:35] Speaker B: I agree. You could buy those attachments for like $180. Wow. [00:12:40] Speaker A: That would be very cool. I think for more reasons than just determining whether or not you have an air leak. [00:12:46] Speaker B: If you just got to tell your spouse you needed it, it's a tool. [00:12:51] Speaker A: Yeah, that's right. It's going to tell us where all the rodents are outside your dark. [00:12:56] Speaker B: That's right. [00:12:56] Speaker A: Yikes. [00:12:58] Speaker B: Or would you want to know? That's the question. [00:13:00] Speaker A: You don't want to know. [00:13:01] Speaker B: All right, next one on the list is to talk about is materials, different insulating materials and r value. When you're choosing insulation materials, you want to make sure you're getting the appropriate r value specifically for your climate. You want to make sure that you're researching the recommended r values, depending on your jurisdiction. So you go to some places, like I said, everything is different around the country. Everybody accepts IRc. Some jurisdictions might say, well, we are 2019 IRc, or we are 2015 IRC. They haven't quite adopted the newer, newer stuff yet. Sure. And that has a lot to do with certain aspects of the code that are written. It's very generic, and it might not work for every single place. So that's why you'll see that. Tony, what is the definition of r value? [00:13:54] Speaker A: Well, r value is basically the ability for your insulation to reduce heat flow. That's really what it's about. They're saying this insulation that you're putting in, the thickness of it, the makeup of it, and what it's made out of, is going to give you an r 21. And that rating, the higher that number, the more likely it is to reduce heat flow. That's really what that's about. [00:14:20] Speaker B: Yeah. Resist. [00:14:21] Speaker A: Yeah, resist heat flow. [00:14:22] Speaker B: The r means r. The higher the. [00:14:24] Speaker A: R value number, the better it insulates against heat flow. That's the matter. [00:14:31] Speaker B: Right. And I'll say one thing I know I've said it on the show many times. Insulation, like fiberglass insulation, is very good at one thing. Insulating, it's very bad at air sealing. Fiberglass insulation does not air seal. [00:14:45] Speaker A: It does not stop air. [00:14:47] Speaker B: No. It will filter it very nicely. Yeah. If you've ever remodeled a home, taken out old trim, and you see that little pink insulation or yellow insulation stuffed around where they would just take a gob of it and stuff it in the side of the window casing, and it's been in there for 30 years, and you pull it out and it's all black. Yeah. Yuck. That's because it's not stopping the airflow. Air is coming right through. [00:15:08] Speaker A: It's only stopping the particles that the air is carrying. [00:15:11] Speaker B: The filth. It's catching all the filth. Yeah. So that's the difference we're talking about with insulating and air ceiling. We're talking about insulation, of course, right now. [00:15:21] Speaker A: But if you wanted to stop air in those situations, you would need to use something like an expanding foam. Yeah, spray foam. It's very notable that you will not want to use around a window or a door, which open and close and have to remain functional. You wouldn't want to use, like, a maximum expanding foam or something like that. They sell window and door expanding foam products specifically for windows and doors. And it's a low expanding foam. It does exactly what you want it to do without impairing your window or door's ability to perform. [00:15:58] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, I've done it. I've used the wrong foam. I installed a door from my garage into my home. I installed it, put the spray foam around it, and after about three minutes, I could no longer open the door. [00:16:12] Speaker A: Just seized it right out. [00:16:13] Speaker B: Yeah. And then I looked at the can and went, oh, grabbed the wrong one. [00:16:17] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:16:17] Speaker B: It just expands so much. And I had to sit out there with a knife and chisel it all out. [00:16:24] Speaker A: Yikes. That's not a fun job, for sure. [00:16:27] Speaker B: All right, next one on the list, Tony, is appropriate insulation type. [00:16:32] Speaker A: There's a lot of them out. [00:16:33] Speaker B: Are, you know, the common types are fiberglass, cellulose, spray foam, rigid foam, and then another one is Roxel. That's becoming more and more popular. [00:16:43] Speaker A: Fire retardant. [00:16:45] Speaker B: It's got a lot of properties. Roxel, it's another name for it. It's mineral wool. It's actually made from stone, stone dust. [00:16:54] Speaker A: Rock wool is also another rock wool. [00:17:00] Speaker B: They crush stone and then mix it with this thing, and it creates these fibers. It's pretty incredible stuff. But the density of it, the insulation value of it, workability and ease of. I mean, it's so cool, Tony. And actually, and we've made sound panels inside of our recording studio out of Roxole that it is so dense, nothing escapes it. [00:17:24] Speaker A: Yeah. It absorbs our sound waves. So they are sound absorption panels, we call them. They reduce the echo in our room. Works really good in here. [00:17:36] Speaker B: And they're, like you said, fire resistant, moisture resistant. It's a very cool product. We are not endorsed by Roxel, but, yeah, we're not. [00:17:45] Speaker A: They do make a great product. [00:17:47] Speaker B: So let's talk a little bit about when you're choosing the appropriate insulation type. We talked about r value, and the higher the r value for certain areas is required, but it's not that simple. For instance, in Oregon, I think our attic space code may have changed. It might be higher now, but for many years, it was r 38, and r 38 was about, what, 16 inches deep. Two x four walls, r 15, two x six walls, r 21. And then your floor was between r 25 and r 30. Now, you could say to yourself, oh, well, maybe I have two x four walls, but I'll just buy r 21 and squish it in there. And it will be r 21. Right? [00:18:40] Speaker A: It won't. [00:18:40] Speaker B: It won't. That's not how insulation works. Insulation works when it is fully uncompressed. [00:18:47] Speaker A: Right. [00:18:47] Speaker B: And if you compress it, you're losing. [00:18:49] Speaker A: All of that ability to do that thing. Right. It's got to be in a space that it's the size that it's made for. [00:18:56] Speaker B: Correct. [00:18:57] Speaker A: Specifically. And cramming it in and folding it in and stuffing it in is defeating the purpose of using it entirely. [00:19:04] Speaker B: Yeah. Doesn't do anything if you need more r value per inch. Fiberglass insulation offers it is what it is. But you can go to different things like Roxel or rigid foam. Rigid foam. And they make different ones. I think dow makes it. Owens corning. [00:19:22] Speaker A: Four x eight sheets. [00:19:24] Speaker B: Yes. And you can get it in different thicknesses. Half inch, one inch, two inch, three inch. And the thing about rigid foam is, depending on the product, it's between r six and a half and r 6.8 per inch. So if you only have a certain amount of space, like in a, say, a cathedral ceiling, I've sold two x ten, two x twelve framed cathedral ceilings. People will have to put in rigid foam to get the r value that they need to get up to r 38 because it's the same. It's not just because it's a smaller space. You still have to get up to r 38. [00:20:06] Speaker A: Right. Absolutely. [00:20:07] Speaker B: So something to consider. [00:20:10] Speaker A: Yeah. And then just to tag one little thing on there, there is in rigid foam. There is like pink foam, blue foam. There's also foil faced foam. [00:20:21] Speaker B: Rmax. [00:20:21] Speaker A: Yep. Or celitex. And that has a little bit higher r value than the other foam. So there's a few options. [00:20:28] Speaker B: And I guess if we're talking about rigid foam, there's also polyiso, which is polyisosanurate, which is like styrofoam. Yeah, it kind of looks like styrofoam. You could break it apart. It's just different. Right. It's used for different things. Like, they'll put it under slabs in a garage if you want to insulate the floor in your garage. [00:20:48] Speaker A: Right. [00:20:48] Speaker B: You can use that just, anyway, lots of different options out there. Just do your research for the situation that you need to use it for. What's the next one? [00:21:00] Speaker A: Tone sealing air leaks. This is a very important one. Before adding insulation, you want to seal the air leaks by using caulk or weather stripping. Corey and I have some experience with this. I haven't built a house. I've done some remodeling. But we definitely determined that one of the things we were going to do when we built the studio that we're recording this in right now is we air sealed the interior of the studio. Right and I'll tell you what, going into it, we had great plans, great ideas, but we didn't really know what we were going to face. And I'll tell you what, we sealed. [00:21:39] Speaker B: This baby up tight as a drum submarine. Yeah. We use sill seal foam on the bottom plate and the top plate. Before we installed the sheet rock, we caulked every penetration, spray foamed the entire perimeter of the floor. Then we installed the sheet rock tape. Mud texture. I mean, it was tight. We installed the door. [00:22:05] Speaker A: We then insulated on that, insulated around all of the switches and outlets. [00:22:11] Speaker B: And it's funny because this space that we're in is very small. It's only eight by eight. [00:22:16] Speaker A: It's like eight by eleven. [00:22:18] Speaker B: Eight by eleven. And we made it so tight, airtight in here that we couldn't even close the door. [00:22:27] Speaker A: Right. We couldn't even close the door. [00:22:29] Speaker B: You would throw the door, you would slam the door and it would bounce and then open back up. [00:22:33] Speaker A: Bounce against the air. [00:22:34] Speaker B: Yeah. Crazy. As a matter of fact, if Tony and I spend too much time in here, we get lightheaded. [00:22:40] Speaker A: Yeah, it's very airtight. We know from that experience that it's a very real thing. And I'll tell you what, in the coldest winters, when we're out here recording and Corey has got this little oil, like a little radiant heater. Just a radiant heater. It doesn't even have an open flame or a hot coil. [00:23:04] Speaker B: Just a radiant heater, radiant oil, radiant heaters. [00:23:07] Speaker A: And the heat comes up inside here and it just stays. It lasts and lasts and lasts. It's very good. Very well done. [00:23:15] Speaker B: Absolutely. [00:23:16] Speaker A: That's check mark one for us. [00:23:18] Speaker B: But the funny thing is good, it was so airtight in here, we had to add a vent. [00:23:21] Speaker A: We had to vent it. [00:23:23] Speaker B: We drilled a four inch diameter hole in the side of the wall through the insulation. We put like a little hood on the outside with a screen, but that stays open all the time. [00:23:33] Speaker A: We built it tight and we ventilated it, right, because that's what we knew we needed to do. Ceiling air leaks will keep you from replacing the air that you're pumping out of the house from the wrong place. You need fresh air to come into the house, but you want to do it intentionally. An example is this. If you're running the dryer or the range hood or an exhaust fan in the bathroom, then open a window. Open up a window, and then you get fresh air through that window. And that's where you want it to come from. But you can seal up all the other areas around the doors and windows, outlets and light fixtures, seal all that up, and then get the air from where you want it to come from, which is from outside through a window. That's the key to breathing. [00:24:21] Speaker B: Breathing. If you don't believe us, stick your head down in your crawl space. And is that the air that you want being sucked up into your house? [00:24:28] Speaker A: Right. Of course not. Or from the garage. [00:24:30] Speaker B: It's disgusting. You don't want that air in there. So seal everything up like I said, seal it up tight and ventilate it. Right. But the other portion of air sealing that we should talk about is when you get into building science and you think about what happens when moisture hits its dew point. [00:24:53] Speaker A: It does what, when vapor. Yeah, when reaches its dew point. When water vapor turns into a droplet. [00:25:00] Speaker B: Yes, it condensates. We all kind of know this because if you breathe on a cold piece of glass, you see it condensate immediately. So in these areas of your home, like in your bathroom, when you have the shower running, if you have a cold air leak in your wall and it's creating a cold surface on the inside of your wall, somewhere, water is going to condensate there. All that water vapor that's blowing around inside your bathroom is going to condensate on the coolest surface it touches. As soon as it hits that dew point, it condensates. And if that's inside of your wall, then you're asking for trouble. It will rot and mold, guaranteed. And I know this because I remodeled my bathroom a few years ago, and they put zero insulation behind my shower, and they did not air seal at all. My house was built in the entire wall plate framing. Everything was roted. I had to tear it all out and rebuild it. It was terrible. [00:26:11] Speaker A: Yikes. [00:26:12] Speaker B: So it's just one of those things. Air sealing is probably as important or a little bit more important than the insulation itself. So if you're insulating your ceiling, air seal it first period. [00:26:25] Speaker A: Yeah, absolutely. [00:26:28] Speaker B: All right, next thing on the list when considering insulating air ceiling is the safety gear you want to make sure that you've invested in the right stuff. Gloves, safety glasses, a good, good dust mask, especially when working with insulation, they make insulation that is fully encapsulated to make it friendly. But you still going to want to wear a dust mask because you're going to have to cut it. You're going to have to be handling it both the ends. [00:26:58] Speaker A: Let's have a conversation about what happens if you insulate without wearing proper eye protection. And gloves. Well, just those two things. [00:27:09] Speaker B: Yes. Especially with fiberglass. We're talking about fiberglass insulation. [00:27:13] Speaker A: Yes, I'm referring to fiberglass insulation. I'm speaking from experience when I tell you this. I was hired. This has been 25 years ago, probably. I was hired by somebody to take the insulation they had already had already purchased and install it in this attic. They were finishing the attic, see? So they wanted to have this finished space up there. And so I installed the. The installation. It was very easy job. Not difficult at all. Carry it up there, put it in, staple off the ears of the craft faced, and then the next piece until it was all done. The problem that I had was that I. Neither was I wearing gloves on my hands, nor was I wearing eye protection. And here's the thing. What that didn't keep me from doing is it didn't keep me from rubbing my eyes. [00:28:02] Speaker B: Oh, man. [00:28:02] Speaker A: The fiberglass in the air landed in my eyes, and then I didn't have gloves on my hands, so I rubbed my eyes, and then it became very, very irritated to the point where I couldn't even see anymore. I had to go to the hospital, have my eyes flushed. They flushed my eyes for 30 minutes, and they took pictures, and they showed me. They dropped dye in my eyes, and the dye showed all of the fiberglass shards that were in my eyes, inside of my lids, around my eyeball, and they had took them 30 minutes to flush it all out. [00:28:37] Speaker B: Brutal. [00:28:38] Speaker A: Absolutely brutal. [00:28:41] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:28:41] Speaker A: You don't want to have to deal with that. Trust me. [00:28:45] Speaker B: I've never had it that bad. But, yes, I have gotten fiberglass insulation in my lungs, and it's just irritated for days and days. It's not worth it. [00:28:56] Speaker A: No. Use gloves and eye protection. That's all there is to it. Use gloves and eye protection or. [00:29:00] Speaker B: And a dust mask. [00:29:01] Speaker A: A dust mask? [00:29:02] Speaker B: Yeah, I think the dust mask and. [00:29:03] Speaker A: A dust mask, definitely. All of those things. [00:29:06] Speaker B: Glasses, dust masks. [00:29:07] Speaker A: You can do it. You just need to be prepared. You need to just dress for it. [00:29:11] Speaker B: Dress for success. [00:29:13] Speaker A: That's right. [00:29:15] Speaker B: All right, let's talk about ventilation. When people think of insulating, they think of insulating the attic, because I would say if you live in an older home, there's probably not enough insulation in your attic. And again, you need about 16 inches to get r 38. So if you take a measuring stick and you stick it down in your insulation, or if you climb up in your attic and you can see the tops of your joists. Ceiling joists. [00:29:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Your joists are not 16 inches tall. I can tell you that at the. [00:29:46] Speaker B: Very most, they might be two x twelve. [00:29:48] Speaker A: You can see the tops of them. There's not enough insulation. [00:29:50] Speaker B: More than likely, yes. So you can take a measuring stick and stick it down till you hit sheet rock and figure out how much insulation you have. And then you kind of give it a math figure out how much more you have to add. But one of the things is when you're up there, you're probably going to be seeing vents. You're going to get out towards the edge. You're going to see the soffit. Soffit vents. You're going to see daylight out there. You need to leave those. [00:30:13] Speaker A: You need to see daylight out there. [00:30:15] Speaker B: That is absolutely required. You need to have ventilation in your soffits. They go all the way up to the ridge. In a lot of houses, you'll have a ridge vent cut in the top. Sometimes you won't. Sometimes you'll have those little pot vents that sit up there like every. You'll see them on the side of the house you walk by and there'll be 20 of those little things sitting on the side on usually the backside of the house. But that's fine. They work the same, but they're drawing air in from the eve, and then it's circulating up through the top. And as the roof heats up, it creates that convection and moves that air around. And that's important. It's very important because if you get any sort of moisture up there, and you will, because as we know, water vapor, you're breathing it out all day. There's humidity in the air. If you're showering, cooking, washing, all that moisture is going to move around, and it will eventually make its way through your sheet rock, through your insulation, and into your attic. And if it's sealed off tight and you don't have any airflow, it's going to condensate and it's going to get nasty. [00:31:28] Speaker A: Yeah, it will rain inside. Basically, the condensation will build up to a point where it starts to drip. It'll drip right through the insulation, and it will drip right down onto whatever is underneath that roof. Mold city personal experience. Seen it happen. That's how it works. So you got to make sure that. [00:31:46] Speaker B: You'Re ventilated right in those soft events. Again, you do not want to block. [00:31:52] Speaker A: Yeah. The temptation will be there as you're adding insulation in the attic to get up to that 16 inches where you want to be. The temptation is to push that tight right over to the corner of the apex where the gutters are on the outside, but you don't want to do that. You want to make sure that you leave that space open so the air can come in through those vents. [00:32:11] Speaker B: They make these little cardboard or foam. Sometimes you get them out of foam that slide down between your roof rafters or your trusses, and then they create that gap so you can insulate right up against it, but it still allows that airflow from your soffit vent to get up and do its job. Now, I had a situation at my house where I had to have my roof reroofed as soon as we bought the house, and going to look at it, the guy that we bought the house from said, oh, it's good. Roof is good. We just had it replaced, like, seven years ago. Well, it wasn't. We had people come out and look, and they said, this roof looks like it's 40 years old. This thing is beat. It needs a new roof. And what had happened is they tore off cedar, shingle, sheeted the whole roof with plywood, and then put asphalt shingles on. Yeah, comp shingles down. And the problem is, there was no ridge vent. And the soffit vents, there were only three on the entire backside of my house and two on the front side of my house, period. [00:33:27] Speaker A: Nowhere near enough. Vintage. [00:33:29] Speaker B: Nowhere near. So what I had to have done was I got, at that time, instead of cutting new holes in my soffit, sometimes you'll see those as bird blocks on the side. Instead of doing that, I decided they make this new product that would go on the roof deck. So they cut a slot above where my overhang is, so technically into the attic. So it sits about 3ft up my roof deck. They cut a slot along it, and then they install these vents that fit over the top of it, and then the roofing goes over the top of that. So then you have this little raised area on the edge of your roof, but it's above the attic line. [00:34:13] Speaker A: Right. [00:34:14] Speaker B: So I had those added, and then I had a roof vent. Ridge vent. [00:34:17] Speaker A: Ridge vent. Yeah. [00:34:19] Speaker B: So that's something to consider. If you have a house that clearly doesn't have enough ventilation in the attic, when you get it reroofed, talk to the roofer and get those installed. I think they look good, and it. [00:34:32] Speaker A: Does a great job keeping that attic cool. [00:34:34] Speaker B: 100%. [00:34:35] Speaker A: Yeah. Local building codes. This is important. Familiarize yourself with the local building codes. You want to know what's expected, the do's and the don'ts. Before you tackle the project. No surprises is the key, right? [00:34:51] Speaker B: Like we said earlier, there are certain areas where you're required to use Visqueen, and you have to tape the viscoen. You cut a little hole in it, you got to repair it and patch it, do all of these things. We don't do that here, so we're not super familiar with it. But again, it's going to be. Depending on your local building code. The next one on the list is to make sure that it's installed properly. We talked a little bit about this before. You want to follow the manufacturer's guidelines when installing it, you want to have proper insulation. Or insulation is crucial for achieving the r value that you are expecting it to be. For instance, we said earlier, if you're going to take an r 25 and stuff it into an r 15 wall thickness, you're losing its r value. You're not doing it any good. [00:35:40] Speaker A: Right. [00:35:41] Speaker B: So you want to make sure. And the other thing is, you don't want to have gaps. So if you had that ir camera and you're looking at a wall, you will see exactly where you missed insulation. Yeah. [00:35:55] Speaker A: Or you didn'tuck it up tight to the last piece or whatever. [00:35:59] Speaker B: If you've gapped it and there's a two inch gap there, you will clearly see that will be a cold spot. [00:36:04] Speaker A: You'll also be able to see the studs in the wall because they have a different insulating value than the insulation that you've put in between them. [00:36:11] Speaker B: Standard lumber has approximately an r one per inch. So if you've got a two x six plus sheet rock, you're probably around an r six at every stud. [00:36:24] Speaker A: Right. And you're going to be r 21 between you're. [00:36:27] Speaker B: Right. [00:36:27] Speaker A: Or 22 or something like that. [00:36:29] Speaker B: That's why when you talk about building new houses, there's lots of new things to do. Staggering studs to create that thermal barrier. [00:36:38] Speaker A: Right. [00:36:39] Speaker B: Or you can get art two x eight walls. Or they're doing 24 inch on center again. So instead of 16 on center, they're going 24 on center. That way it gives you more insulation than wood. It's more energy efficient. [00:36:54] Speaker A: Very good moisture control. Very important. [00:36:59] Speaker B: Yeah, we talked a little bit about this. [00:37:02] Speaker A: Just make sure that you're installing vapor barriers or moisture resistant insulation in the areas prone to dampness, like the bathroom. We talked about earlier basements and crawl spaces. You did touch on encapsulating a crawl space or what did you say? Finishing a crawl space? [00:37:21] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, it's conditioned. [00:37:23] Speaker A: Conditioned. [00:37:24] Speaker B: Having a conditioned crawl space, it's different than, like, what building all over the country is different everywhere. And here in Oregon, southwest Washington, everyone has the crawl space is king. Everybody puts up crawl spaces. And then you have these vents, like tons and tons of these vents that go all the way around. [00:37:42] Speaker A: Foundation vents. [00:37:43] Speaker B: Foundation vents. And that allows all that air to just freely move around in there. But it also causes a lot of problems. You get a rodent that says, is a little piece of screen going to stop a rodent? [00:37:58] Speaker A: Right. [00:37:59] Speaker B: You're going to chew right through that. Next thing you know, they're like, great. It's tight, toasty down here. Oh, look, all this insulation. So now there's different ways of building that. You can basically insulate the walls on the inside of your crawl space and then seal it up completely. Pour concrete slab down there. So it's like basically having a tiny basement. It's like a crawl space, but it might only be two or 3ft deep, but it's treated as if it was a conditioned space. It has air conditioning, it has heat. You basically put a vent down there straight from your furnace, and it conditions that air, and that reduces a lot of problems in the long run. If I were to build my own house, that's exactly how I would do it. Yeah. [00:38:47] Speaker A: It definitely reduces the likelihood of. Obviously, it reduces rodents entirely, the likelihood of mold or those types of things that would be in the air that's coming into the home because of air ceiling issues in the home. [00:39:02] Speaker B: You've been down in my crawl space. You would never want a crawl space. [00:39:05] Speaker A: Oh, baby. [00:39:06] Speaker B: Disgusting. [00:39:06] Speaker A: Oh, baby. [00:39:07] Speaker B: Hate it. [00:39:08] Speaker A: How about budget considerations are different types of insulations that people are choosing from. They have different cost points, different price points. [00:39:19] Speaker B: Spray foam. People have seen, we've seen spray foam where they go in and they have the two component thing. It's this chemical comes through in this thing and they spray it in, then it, woof. It just expands out. Right. Stuff is amazing. Seals it up tight as a drum. Problem is expensive, so you can do that. You're spending a lot. So are you going to get your money's worth out of it? You have to consider that when you're spray foaming an area, you could spray foam your old house. It might cost you 100 grand. Yeah, I don't know. Don't get mad at me if you're a spray foam guy, but it's going to cost a lot more than other things like fiberglass or blown in loose fill. [00:40:00] Speaker A: But it's the best. Some people want the best. [00:40:02] Speaker B: It is the best. So we recently went through this. My wife and I recently went through this, we were looking at new cars. And I know this is controversial. We were looking at a hybrid versus the regular, and the hybrid premium was like ten grand to get a new car as a hybrid versus the gas. And it was like the hybrid got like 30 miles to the gallon. The non hybrid got like 22 miles to the gallon. And then I did the math on it. I was like, okay, at eight more miles per gallon, x amount of miles per month, I was just, like, calculating away, like, how much more gas are we going to spend? And it equated to, like 20 more gallons a month. So at $5 a gallon, let's just say it would take ten years to. [00:40:57] Speaker A: Pay that ten grand to pay the. [00:40:59] Speaker B: Difference in the hybrid. So we didn't end up doing that. I know people. Listen, is going to be like, what? [00:41:07] Speaker A: Yeah, well, spray and insulation. If you're doing a remodel and you're making insulation decisions, it's a really good contender. I know that it's more expensive, but it's the very best. And you don't have any questions about it. [00:41:22] Speaker B: Well, I think about, like, the biggest things about insulating an air ceiling is comfortability. And your electric and gas bill. You think about your bills, those are going to be reduced significantly. And the comfortability. If you're sitting in your living room and you feel the cold air coming in from the window and the outlet and the ceiling and everywhere, this cold air is just hitting you all the time. How comfortable are you? Right. What if it's 72 degrees in your living room? Then you go to the bedroom and it's 65 degrees. Then you go to another room and it's 87. These are just the things. Because different. If it's not insulated and air seat sealed properly, the comfortability of your home is going to be terrible. [00:42:07] Speaker A: Yeah, it's definitely something to consider. And spray foam is not the only other option. You can have insulation blown in. They call that loose fill insulation. You can actually buy loose fill in a bag and install it yourself, or you can have somebody come with a machine and blow it in. Less expensive than spray foam, maybe still better than bat insulation. It kind of has a way to get into those nooks and crannies and fill that stuff up. So lots of options. Consider what you want to do when you're making your budget. [00:42:39] Speaker B: Yeah. What I would say is, if you're going to do it yourself, just do the research. Make sure you take your time and you're filling that cavity correctly. Because like I said, if you get an IR camera and look at it. You will see every screw up that you made on that wall. Next one list is to consider timing. When's the best time to undertake insulating your attic? And I'm going to give you a hint. Not in July. [00:43:08] Speaker A: It's not in September. [00:43:09] Speaker B: Oh, Lord. [00:43:10] Speaker A: Or August. [00:43:11] Speaker B: Have you ever crawled in your attic in August? [00:43:14] Speaker A: Yes, I have. If it's hot enough up there to melt candles, you don't want to be installing insulation. I can tell you that right now. [00:43:22] Speaker B: Instant, instant misery. [00:43:24] Speaker A: Yeah. Bad. Not a good situation. [00:43:26] Speaker B: Try doing it in December. Yeah. Great. Time to insulate your attic. Last one list. We kind of touched on this already. Comfort. Comfortability. And when you're installing, make sure you're wearing the proper gear. You want to dress properly. When I do insulation. Now, Tony, you know what I wear? [00:43:44] Speaker A: You wear a bunny suit. [00:43:46] Speaker B: I do, but I bought one instead of buying those Tyvek bunny suits. [00:43:51] Speaker A: Oh, right. Those don't work. [00:43:52] Speaker B: I'm a big guy. [00:43:53] Speaker A: Me too. [00:43:53] Speaker B: They don't fit right. You zip it up and it's like, next thing you know, you bend over and it splits right down the back. I went and bought. [00:44:00] Speaker A: When we did your crawl space, mine was hanging off of me. I looked like the incredible hulk after I changed back to Bruce Banner. [00:44:08] Speaker B: It made no sense. [00:44:09] Speaker A: It's just shredded and hanging off of me all over. I'd have been better off to just go in without it. But I tried. [00:44:16] Speaker B: I went out and bought myself a pair of overalls. Like mechanic style overalls. Yeah. And then my gloves. I put my gloves on and I run duct tape around where it touches the thing. And then I put my dust mask and glasses and I wear a hat. [00:44:32] Speaker A: Coveralls is the way to go. It's nice, heavy duty, durable material. [00:44:36] Speaker B: Wash them. [00:44:37] Speaker A: They make them in lots of different sizes. Throw them in the washing machine and wash it after. Yeah. It's a good way to go. [00:44:42] Speaker B: I agree. [00:44:43] Speaker A: Very durable. This is a good show. I'm really glad we talked about this. Insulating and air ceiling will absolutely change the efficiency of your home. If your home is not as efficient as you want it to be, take a look at your insulation and your air ceiling and find out what you can do based on that to make your home more efficient and save you money in cooling and heating bills. [00:45:07] Speaker B: Absolutely. If you got any questions about this show, you can email us. We're at [email protected]. That's parr.com. If you got anything you want to add, questions, comments, anything like that. Send that to us. If you found anything in this podcast that you found interesting that somebody else might like, send it to them. Send them a copy. [00:45:27] Speaker A: Absolutely. [00:45:28] Speaker B: Link it right where you're listening to it and send it to them. Make sure you go check out our Facebook and Instagram. We are at ww home show. You can also find all of our videos on YouTube. If you go search, just search the weekend warriors home improvement show or par lumber. It will come right up. [00:45:43] Speaker A: Yeah. YouTube.com at par lumber. P-A-R-R lumber. [00:45:49] Speaker B: You. Yes, sir, that's it. Well, thanks so much for listening and we'll see you next time. [00:45:53] Speaker A: Have a great week. Bye.