Air Sealing is incredibly important. Bugs, even rodents get in as your money leaks out. In short, every wire, pipe, light, window, door, skylight, bath fan and duct should be absolutely air tight. In addition to those smaller air leaks, there are many large air leaks. Uncapped chases and top-plates, poor air-barrier alignment at showers, tubs and window seats, and exposed attic wall insulation are very common. Here is a technician using gun-foam to seal the top-plates of an older home. The idea here, is to keep air from inside the wall from getting in the attic.
Do you have all your Ducks-in-a-Row? All ducts need to be sealed, especially those that are located in a vented attic or vented crawlspace. The pros at Stetten Home Services have been sealing duct-work since 2006 or prior. Often "Duct-Sealing" is not a stand-alone service, rather it is lumped together with a more involved weatherization process. One thing to understand about leaky ducts in vented attics and vented crawlspaces, is that they cause the house to leak "double-time". If your system can move 1000CFM (Cubic Feet per Minute) and it leaks 10% or 100CFM into the attic, then another 100CFM must leak into the building from other openings in the envelope, bringing the total loss to 200CFM or 20%.
Foil as a building product doesn't pass the "field test". Foil only, or paper re-enforced foil Radiant Barrier products are really useless in buildings. If you are going to install anything with staples or button caps, it might as well have some durability or insulating qualities to it. All you need is scissors and a staple gun. It reflects heat well, but the down side is that the big bubbles do not insulate very well, therefore this product fails to protect against "conduction" when applied to wall studs.
Stetten Home Services is different. We remove obsolete building materials from your home. Look at our pictures to see we take craftsmanship seriously and never leave a mess for the homeowner to deal with. Future work in the space is pleasant. Workers don't have to deal with formaldehyde laden, itchy, or contaminated insulation. Normally, foam contractors "rake-back" or "hold-back" old insulation temporarily to spray insulation into a new place. The result: a completely air-tight building envelope, full of dusty insulation no longer needed.
Stetten Home Services is a locally owned handyman company serving the Triangle, Triad, and Wilmington areas of North Carolina. Building a new building takes enormous amounts of energy. If you are lucky, your home was carefully planned and constructed to be enjoyable, durable, efficient, and problem free. With regular maintenance, a building should stand proud for hundreds of years. Sadly, most of the people visiting this site are living in uncomfortable and inefficient homes. We want you to call us now!
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