I have an exterior basement wall that was "finished" with studs & drywall by a previous owner. I noticed the wall was cold, and there is a tremendous draft coming out of the electric sockets. I opened it up to peak, and it is not insulated. If I pull the old drywall off to insulate properly...

Hi all, I've been reading up online and am more confused than ever about the vapor barrier location on rim joist. I live in okanagan, BC, Canada. Dry hot summers, moderately cold Winter. My home has a 2 foot concrete foundation wall (6" thick) exterior dirt varies from half to top of concrete...

We are completely restoring a single story, 3bd/2ba house. We live at 2800ft in California (climate zone 2 or 3). The house has board and batten siding (either rough pine or cedar). The house is wrapped with some type of weather barrier, followed by the sheathing. Attached to the back of the...

Hi has anyone dealt with a crawlspace like this? The ground is very uneven, covered with boulders and a lot of support columns. House was built in 1850. The ground is very damp as you can see. I've put a 70 pint dehumidifier since this photo was taken and it really helps keeping the humidity...

I have a 20×25 detached metal garage that I'm turning into a climate controlled workshop. I'm installing a 36K BTU mini-split A/C. I live in North Central Florida so I will be cooling 9-10 months of the year. I'm gutting this building down to the studs, adding some wiring and then insulating and...

I have a 20×25 detached metal garage that I'm turning into a climate-controlled workshop. I'm installing a 36K BTU mini-split A/C. I live in North Central Florida so I will be cooling 9-10 months of the year. I'm gutting this building down to the studs, adding some wiring, and then insulating...

I have a 20×25 detached metal garage that I'm turning into a climate controlled workshop. I'm installing a 36K BTU mini-split A/C. I live in North Central Florida so I will be cooling 9-10 months of the year. I'm gutting this building down to the studs, adding some wiring and then insulating and...

Hi folks, I'm working on the top floor of my 1905 fixer upper foursquare in Pittsburgh, PA. One of the jobs is to make the temperature much more comfortable, as it has no problem reaching triple digits in the peak of the summer. I'll be adding a whole house fan to pull the cooler air from the...

I’m turning a garage into a workshop. I plan to cover the concrete floor to cushion my old bones and joints. I’ll lay furring strips in one direction only, so air can circulate. I won’t fasten the furring strip to the concrete. I’ll screw 3/4” t &g plywood to the strips. My question is, should...

Hey guys! I have a 24x24ft unfinished garage that I’d like to insulate and Drywall/paint. Home is located south of Boston, Massachusetts. There is no living space above the garage and the “attic” portion of the garage is vented via the soffits. I plan to use R-13 Faced insulation all around...

My home's insulation is totally inadequate. It has some sort of blown in cellulose fiber insulation. When I moved some of the laid in place pieces of plywood looking for a wiring fault, which I found by the way, I saw that the grey white fibers are now compacted down to 2 inches at most. Is it...

I'm remodeling a 40 year old cabin in East Texas (Zone 8) that previously didn't have any insulation in the walls nor was it conditioned. The exterior is board and baton siding with Roofing felt as a WRB. No external sheathing is present under the WRB. I'm filling the stud bays with Rockwool...

I have an old house basement that is half crawl-space and the other half is an unfinished basement with stone walls. I have the furnace in the basement, so that actually it never gets cold in there during the winter I want to replace the existing 'ceiling' insulation that was poorly installed...

Hi, I need to replace vapor barrier and Mold ( clean, disinfect, protect) the wood) remediation. Q1) Which one should I do first? Q2) Should I Pin the barrier down or tape it? Some folks are very picky and say the holes around the nail would pass the gas and vapor through it. Q3) does the...

Had a home in Michigan inspected earlier this week. Mostly minor issues, but one thing worries me. I attach three pictures from the crawlspace. The block walls look to be in bad shape, and you can see that there is water under the vapor barrier. It's been very dry here for the past few weeks...

Hi. We just moved into a home that has sheet vinyl directly on top of a concrete slab on a porch. Moisture is coming up thru the slab and to the vinyl. I really do not want to have to waste this new flooring. Can i put down 6mil plastic visqueen under the sheet vinyl? if i do, how will the vinyl...

I have a house with a converted garage into a living room. It is sunken living room with a 2 steps which is around 13 inches below the rest of the house. I want to raise this up as its a safety hazard with young children. The room currently has carpet right over top of the concrete and the steps...

A friend of mine is redoing her garage into a hot glass studio. She wants to put up corrugated metal panels as the interior walls for fire purposes. She wants in insulate the walls-I am unsure on this. There will be kilns and a glory hole inside. These reach internal temperatures of...

We are remodeling our kitchen and ended up removing insulation on about 14 feet of exterior wall and of course need an insulation inspection. The inspector was not sure if we needed a vapor barrier....which leads me to all kinds of question! House was built in 1981, we live in the Denver area...

Hey guys, I hate to even post this as it's been discussed a million times all over the internet, but the answer still remains open, with lots of different arguments and ideas as to why it should be done a certain way, and no clear cut answer that I could find. I'm remodeling my bathroom, and...