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Old 10-10-15, 10:52 AM   #11
gtojohn
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BTW, if it were mine and I wanted to go ocd on it I'd paint the attic side of the roof decking with the cheapest white house paint I could find. White does a great job as a radiant barrier. After the paint job then do the kitchen foil for a double whammy on the solar gain!

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Old 10-11-15, 12:02 AM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by gtojohn View Post
Out of curiosity, how does it feel in there? I bet the breeze doesn't just rip through there anymore. Probably quieter too. While the ceiling is open consider radiant barrier...on the cheap...Renolds Wrap Heavy duty $8 for 250 sqft. [IMG][/IMG]
Actually, that's how I did the last round of sealing on the space: with the door open, any drafty spots revealed themselves. All those blocked-in cavities became very still and quiet where the foam did its job. Just a small pressure difference in the structure made obvious breezes flow through spots that needed to be sealed. I didn't need to use smoke or anything.

I was on the fence about taping up the seams where I cut sections of the rmax board to fill some wall sections. After the spray foam operation, the same effect can be observed, even in some places where the pieces seem to fit well. IMHO, it would be stupid not to tape all of these seams before covering them up.
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Old 10-11-15, 03:01 PM   #13
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I haven't convinced dude about his roof yet. That's why I began with the wall and soffit sealing. He is convinced that the corrugated white roof and the felt paper under it will reject enough heat from the sun. After all, he has two roofs now, right?

He is so convinced of a few things with the fiberglass batt that I'm not sure I can change his mind. He doesn't believe he will have a vapor barrier sandwich if we staple the facing to the downhill edge of the rafters. He believes the facing adds r value. Worst of all, he is confident that we will get r19 out of the roof deck, air gap, and 4 inch thick r13 batts.
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Old 11-12-15, 10:19 PM   #14
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Progress pics:
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This is how much wall you can fill with one bundle of 23" wide batts.
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Since the rmax and pink panther has gone in, my buddy is now convinced that doing the underside of the roof is a worthwhile investment. The sealing and foam board made the air still inside the building, the fiberglass batts made it silent in there. While we were fitting and stapling up batts, the difference was immediately noticeable. With the batt in your hands, road noise and birds and dogs could be heard through the wall. Once the batt was stuffed in position, 99 percent of those sounds went away.

I am not overly concerning myself with sealing all the seams in between the batts and studs. If some water finds its way into the wall cavity, there are some nooks and crannies here and there so it can find its way out. Lowe's has a sale going on right now for 10 bucks off per bundle of the pink ecotouch batts, no matter what width you buy. He loaded up and bought 6 bags. If we have extra, we can always take them back later. Don't know how long the sale is going on, but he saved 60 this time. If he had studs on 16 inch centers he would have saved even more, closer to 90 dollars.
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Old 11-23-15, 08:10 PM   #15
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Well, 99 percent of the insulating is now done. I have to say, for an old detached garage, the place is actually comfortable now. The parts of the building that I sealed up with foam leaked a lot less air than I had imagined they would. The R13 on the inside is doing its job quite well. If the crew who fixed his sagging block wall would have put 2x4 studs facing long side in and out for purlins, I could have put R19 in without some really crazy framing, but the way it is now is worlds apart from just sheet metal.


Repaired wall section before this weekend

Corner section before this weekend

Corner section today

Corner and roof above entry door

The wall sections will be covered over soon. Dude can't make up his mind what to use, but it will be something more durable than drywall. I was on the fence abvout whether or not to tape up all of these seams, and I still kind of am. Dude would not let me install the batts with the vapor barrier facing the polyiso board, he said it just "looked wrong". Taping up the seams would do even more sealing, but it doesn't hardly leak air at all. What do you guys think? Do I tape the seams and make a sandwich with one really tight surface, or just leave it how it is?

Winter finally set in this weekend while I was stapling up the roof batts. We thought the roof might have had a leak, because the boards in one corner were damp when I got up there to insulate. It had been raining pretty hard last week, so we left it alone.

I had been running this for a temporary heat source:

Ghetto Hyper-heater mode

I came back the next day to inspect the area around noon. It had been cloudy and raining that day. When I checked the area, it was bone dry. No loose screws on the roof, no water anywhere. Later that afternoon, I checked again. Original spot was dry, some tar paper sticking through clapboards was trying to get damp. I figured out that the roof was condensing the moisture out of the air as I heated the inside! Boy, what a relief.

Due to the added insulation, the little 5000 btu air conditioner turned backwards actually put a pretty good dent in the cold. Dude walked in after feeding his dogs outside and asked me how the place was warm. Evidently, that had never happened before without a forced air kerosene heater. I think it will take him awhile before he asks why he didn't do this a long time ago... he is still feeling guilty about spending the money on insulation.

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