Baby it's cold inside

12/15/16:  This was drafted about two years ago, but I never posted it.  It has a great picture from the same perspective as today's The Walls Are Finished! post.


Happy December 1st.  We're in the middle of a typical New England fall around here:  70s one day, 30s the next (with lows in the single digits).  With our demolished kitchen, some mornings have been *cold*!

If you have an older house, it's safe to assume that either a) it's not insulated at all or b) someone (maybe even you) has "blown-in" insulation.  I've learned that you usually see blown-in insulation in two forms:  cellulose (think the paper pulp-based small animal bedding in the turquoise-colored block) or fiberglass.  From the outside, they drill holes into every single stud space, insert a hose, and fill the cavity with the filling.  As in our case, they might cover the hole with a bit of plywood, a small piece of styrofoam if you're lucky, and then cover it with your siding.  This will become important in a minute.

For what it's worth, I remember Mrs. M telling us that we had blown-in cellulose.

I've known (source unknown) that plaster is generally more insulating than sheetrock.  But I wanted to know how much better fiberglass (batts) is than cellulose, so set to Google to find out.  The general impression I got:  both have about the same R value (for the newbies, that's how they describe a material's insulating ability - the higher the number, the better it insulates).  This generalization makes one major assumption, though:  proper installation.  Neither material will work as an airblock.  If air can pass through it, you won't get nearly the same results.  Fortunately, a vapor barrier (which should be installed if you're taking down the walls) will also act as an air barrier.  The vapor barrier I most commonly see is that Tyvek wrap stuff they sell at your local big box home improvement store.

To be fair, not everyone has the luxury of taking down walls and properly installing insulation.  It's a messy, long process.  So I don't blame anyone for going the route of blown-in insulation.  Just don't expect the same results.

Once we got the plaster down, we saw that we didn't have cellulose; it was actually fiberglass.  So we donned gloves (just buy a big box of disposable nitriles!  They're worth it), masks, eye protection (glasses, in my case, but otherwise I would have used goggles), and long-sleeved t-shirts.   Despite this, I still itched.  Take a shower immediately.  And those bath poofs work *great* for scrubbing off any stray bits of fiberglass; they have enough scratch to them to scrape it off.