First, decide whether you want your crawl space heated, warm, or cold. (search keyword "crawl space" for the title "BASEMENT: HEATED SPACE, WARMED SPACE, OR COLD SPACE?")Insulating under the floor is usually done by first stapling a plastic vapour barrier to the underside of the floor. This ...
I always loved this idea -- heat the floor and distribute warm air throughout the ground floor at the same time. It is a practice that is legal under certain limited conditions, but the problem is that it dries out the wood in the floor space so much that, when a high-temperature furnace is ...
Tanya from Surrey, British Columbia has a very shallow, very wet, very cold crawl space under her house, and the heating bills show it. She has tried all the weather-stripping and caulking she can do up in the house. Now what to do about the crawl space?First, despite the fact that there is ...
Gills writes from South Surrey, B.C.:Problem: High humidity in a crawl space. What do you suggest to reduce this problem. Info: Rancher style home (single level), 1800 sq.ft. Crawl space: 6 ft. high, concrete floor No windows The only existing opening is a 6 inch pipe going out side.---------...
An earthen crawl space or basement is a terrible source of humidity. The ground under the house, given most soil conditions, will continually feed water up to the surface -- where it will evaporate up into the house. Here vapour diffusion is important because there is nothing stopping this ...
Insulating hot water lines that run through a heated basement or crawl space sounds logical, but in fact it will same you little or no money. The infrequency of their use lets them cool off whether they are insulated or not, and the heat is converted to useful room heat anyway.
The exception is ...
A basement that has more than 50 per cent of its height sticking out of the ground is not really a basement. The walls should be treated as ordinary, above-ground walls. The foundations should be treated as slab-on-grade to avoid frost problems.
Interior/exterior insulation combinations can be u...
Bruce from Thunder Bay writes:
I own a mobile home that is 12' x 64' and I have to replace the skirting around the base and which product is best to use. You always talk about regular homes but not mobile homes and we need help too. In the area that I live in there is a very high water table and...
Fiberglass batts, mineral wool batts and all kinds of rigid foam boards are commonly used to insulate basements both inside and outside.
One of the critical rules when insulating basements on the inside is that there must be no air space between the insulation and the wall. (see no air space beh...
It is always better to insulate on the outside of basements and crawl spaces, but usually more expensive and more trouble.
Brick or field stone foundations must not be insulated on the inside for much more than one foot below ground level. The poor quality of the mortar in these foundations dete...
