Way deep in insulation

Me, in a state of dusty exhausted misery

Nance getting in on the action gluing the Insulweb on the first floor

Apparently the newspaper is pulverized before becoming cellulose to the point that you aren't supposed to find individual letters, but Joe found this plus a couple of other semi-discernible bits of type. I love that our house is going to be kept warm by newspapers

Before we started blowing-in on the first floor

We've been working really hard on the insulation process. At first it seemed easy, just blowing in tons of cellulose and filling up all the wall and roof space, but then it got much harder when I went back to do the second pass where we bring the cellulose up to the optimal 3.5 lbs. per cubic foot density. This requires reaming the 2" aluminum supply tube into the same nebulous mass again and again and again until you feel like you can't do it any more and then doing it a little more on the chance you missed something.

This is all done at really awkward angles either above your head or at your feet up in the rafters with dust everywhere, an inadequate dust mask over your mouth and a plastic face shield on to keep cellulose from blasting into your eyes when you pull the insertion tube out of the ceiling for the millionth time. Blech! I'm not really for complaining, but this was one job where I just felt like it was an act of will to keep going and do it as well as I could.

The second floor is basically complete, and that was the worst of it. We are in the middle of insulating the first floor and there is much less volume to fill, so its going much quicker, plus its easy to do this work when you just need to stand next to a wall--unlike the complicated mess upstairs! We'll have the first pass on the first floor done tomorrow.

Insulweb instal

I had to go to an office supply store to find gallon quantities of Elmer's Glue, our current means of attaching the Insulweb to the framing

Putting up the Insulweb fabric

The second floor almost complete

We are continuing to put up the Insulweb retaining fabric and its going just fine. The second floor is the more complex part of the house to do and we have just a little more work to do there tomorrow morning and then we'll start actually blowing in the cellulose insulation. For those who may be unfamiliar with cellulose, it pulverized newsprint that has been treated with a borate for fire retardancy, mold and pest control and just small amount of mineral oil to help keep dust down.

Goodbye framing

Before starting the fabric installation

The Insulweb fabric stapled in place

Applying the glue

Ready for insulation

We are beginning the insulating process.

On Friday I put up the first large areas of Insulweb, which is a retaining fabric that will be attached everywhere that we'll be insulating--along the exterior walls and second floor ceilings.

The key is to get the fabric quite taught, so I stapled it up neatly at each corner and then carefully worked it along the whole perimeter. Once the fabric is hung, I come back with a roller and an adhesive glue that I then roll along all the framing members under the fabric. This fixes the fabric wherever it comes in contact with the wood. As soon as we've got the fabric up throughout the whole house, we'll start blowing the cellulose insulation into all the wall and roof areas through small slits in the fabric.

Its such a relief to finally be moving onto this work after a long haul leading up to this point. I expect this work to go relatively quickly and then we'll be on to sheetrocking.

We're ready

The insulation in our local supplier's warehouse pending delivery tomorrow

Cleaned up

We cleared everything out in order to store the insulation shown in the top photo inside the house once its delivered

Joe finished off the last of the baffles in the roof over the 2nd floor guest room

After what seems like such a long time we are finally ready to insulate.

On Tuesday morning, Bill Hulstrunk is going to come and perform a blower door test on the house to check for air leaks. From what I've read, air leakage can cause anywhere from 30 percent to 50 percent of the heat loss in some homes.

The blower door test is a proceedure where you negativly pressurize the house and measures the rate of airflow required to maintain the building at a certain pressure. We'll be able to quantify the area of leakage. Vent ducts and other intentional openings are all closed so the house is otherwise sealed.

Typically a blower door test is done after insulating has occurred, but I want to know what leaks are present before we insulate while we can still get at them. Whatever the result, the cellulose insulation will be working for us as an air barrier in the walls, so its a sure thing that our numbers will go up. I would expect most leakage would be around the windows and doors, so we'll be checking for that.

Joe finished up the baffles in the long roof rafter bays and I spent the better part of Friday sealing every imaginable air passage around the windows and doors. I've been half-joking with folks that I'll pay $10 bucks to anyone who can find a hole anywhere in the house.

The first batch of insulation will delivered tomorrow.

Pre-insulation and other news

Stops in the rafter bays. These are meant to create smaller compartments into which we'll be blowing in the cellulose. The smaller spaces help to avoid settling in a really long uninterrupted bay

Joe installing the fabric stops

Expanding foam installed between the window frame and the framing

Checking to see what sun is available when. The solar hot water panel will be placed at the upper right hand corner of the roof on the right. The key hours for solar activity are between 10:00 and 2:00. We'll be in good shape with this location

Like the first few raindrops before a shower, there is tangible evidence of our being very close to insulating. I've been spending time installing insulating foam around the windows, Joe has been installing fabric stops in the roof framing cavities, I have the cellulose blower on site, and our supplier is due to deliver 450 bales of cellulose on Thursday. Yes, 450.

We are busily checking off the last few items that need to be taken care of before we start sheathing the walls with Insulweb fabric, which is the first step in the insulating process. Its felt like we've been so close to ready for a while but there are seemingly always a few more things needing to be cleared up.

In other news, we have done some research and have now worked out the arrangements such that we'll be able to install a hot-water solar panel on the roof. This will supply hot water to our boiler so that it does not need to heat the otherwise cold water all the way from cold up to hot. With the collector in place there may be times when the boiler does not need to heat the water at all.

We are really excited about this development, thinking it would be something we'd plan for in the future but couldn't do now. Knowing we wanted to do it eventually, I installed the necessary copper lines so we wouldn't have to open up the walls later on. As I was doing this work it seemed like maybe we should just see what it would take to do it now, knowing it would save some headaches later on. One thing led to another and with the Federal credit it looks like its going to work out.