Room Above Garage

Amitabh

Hello All

The room above my garage is cold. I suspect that below the floor, ie. the ceiling of the garage is not insulated.

The ceiling is drywalled and taped over the joints and screws.

My question

1. how do i figure out if its properly insulated.
2. do i need to remove all the sheets of dry wall, if so, is it easy?

Amitabh

joecaption

Go back and add your location to your profile. No way to suggest what insulation is needed with out the location.
A simple hole would be enough to see what's up there.
Easy? As compaired to what?
It's a dirty messy job and even less fun to have to reinstall it and tape and finish.

Amitabh

Hi Joe

I dont mind getting dirty, how big of a hole should i make. I am in Toronto, Ontario. It gets as low as -30 celcious (or -22 F).

if i dont see insulation, does that mean i have to take everything down. I am assuming so.

bpress54

A hole big enough to look into and see if there is insulation in there. You don't have to take all the drywall down, you might also look into getting blown-in-insulation instead of batting.

joecaption

My guess would be there is going to be some, just not enough and I'd also bet nothing got air sealed before the sheetrock went up. (sealing up all the holes where wires and plumbing were run.)
http://greenzone.com/general.php?section_url=12

Windows on Wash

Thermal bridging of the framing is still going to make is be a bit cold but insulating and air sealing it (via dense packing) will certainly help a whole lot.

Do you have a knee wall or is it full footprint?

Post up some pictures and that will tell us how best to tackle it. The best of both worlds would be to drop the ceiling, insulate, air seal, install some rigid foam, and re-drywall. Most expensive as well.

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Amitabh

THanx for the input, i think i might be getting ahead of myself as the weather is getting colder and colder. i dont like working outside with temperatures close to zero C, i guess i was optimistic that i could work on it, as this past weekend was well above 15 C.

I will most likely want to take down all the dry wall and do it properly one time as the entire footprint of the ceiling is under the bedroom. Its not a knee wall.

This thread will be delayed until spring 2013!

thank you for your input, very much appreciated.