Retrofit / Discussions

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My house was built in the Late 1940 - early 1950's, it is a farm buglalow with an addition in 1973, a poured concrete basement and concrete block foundation addition. The basement is not insulated, the roof has very little insulation with vermiculite ( been tested ok) in the attic.  I wanted to find out where to start,...

I have an old home, circa 1920’s, I’m currently renovating in Saskatchewan, Canada. I want to add insulation on the exterior of the home. The house is currently covered with an old concrete type stucco that may be original? I was thinking a “bubble wrap” type product, strapping then siding. I’m second guessing myself n...

...retrofit for high end performance (It’s LEED Platinum), you could back off a bit on the insulation levels if it helped you afford a geothermal system. As for a backup heating system, a wood stove would certainly provide you with that, but before going shopping I would recommend familiarizing yourself with the very stri...

What is the best way to insulate from the outside? Rock wool? How costly of a project is this? Here is an article that will give you a starting place about tearing down or rebuilding old walls. And here's another page all about how best to insulate exterior walls from the outside on older homes. Have a read over that t...

We have an extremely old house and we are loosing lots of heat, looking to do  upgrades and want to know if there are tax credits available. Tax credits and financial incentives for home energy efficiency upgrades and renos are different by region, and they are prone to come and go pretty quickly. You can see what gran...

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The local ventilation consultants wish to install a second ducting system, in addition to the returns and ducts for a electric-wood forced hot air system For a house of its age and depreciation, and our likely ten additional years ownership, the investment of $4000 is too high The street wise contractors say, just open...

I have 1920's house in Minneapolis, I'm thinking about tearing the siding off and adding 12" deep Larsen trusses with dense packed cellulose. The guides I've see in Fine HomeBuiding magazine suuggest the best route is apply poly barrier on the outside as the R 40 gain from the trusses would stop any moisure from conden...

I live in Southern Alberta and will be replacing my exterior vinyl siding with wood, I also want to add insulation at the same time. It's a 2x4 wall with pink insulation and a vapour barrier behind the drywall,  and only vinyl on the outside. There are a lot of different kinds of rigid foam panel and I don't want to ch...