Answer Two Any power exhaust ventilator taking its air from inside the house (bathroom fans, kitchen fans, clothes dryers, central all-house exhaust fans) will raise the neutral plane whatever the location of its input or output -- although they will be more effective if they draw air from high i...
Radiant Heating and Convection Heating are the two primary types of ways we heat our houses. FORCED AIR HEATINGConvection heating means moving hot air -- what we usually call a forced air heating system simply heats air and moves it around the house through a system of fans and ducts. Forced air...
The National Building Code of Canada, the basis for most building codes in the country, requires mechanical ventilation in all new housing because it is now recognised that our modern energy efficient homes must have the possibility of good through ventilation beyond opening windows.There are man...
I am always amazed at house construction where so often things are half built or more while people are running around beginning to think about "extras" that should never be though of as "extras" but as part of the essential system. So time for one of my lectures -- (you asked for it).Heating is o...
Feeling down, particularly in the Fall as the days get shorter? Sometimes it feels like the flue or it can even go to severe depression. This glum feeling in the Fall of every year has been tagged SAD or Seasonal Affective Disorder.It is attributed primarily to decreasing light exposure, but I ...
The minimum control for a bathroom fan is a simple wall switch.Sometimes the bathroom lights and the fan will be tied together. Now when you have a noisy fan, this can be quite tiring, so to avoid the noise you use the bathroom in the dark.The biggest problem with the simple wall switch control ...
Patrick from Richmond BC is complaining of condensation in his bedroom windows. Why is it that our bedroom windows seem to fog up more often than any other windows in the house?Condensation is caused by a combination of low temperatures and high humidity. We tend to keep our bedrooms cooler tha...
Bernice from Midland, Ontario wants to know how to get more insulation into her vaulted, or cathedral ceiling.The common problem with structures like this, that we call "compact roofs", is that there is not usually enough space for a lot of insulation and a lot of ventilation. In fact, when the ...
Mike writes: "I'm renovating my bathroom and plan to install a fan. The shower is on one side of the room and the bath is on the opposite wall so I plan to put the fan in the middle of the room. What is the maximum amount of hose I can use to vent outside?"You shouldn't have any problem going ...
Kara lives in BC and has foam insulation over her roof with shingles over the foam. She wants to put on new shingles and questions having them right over the foam.You are right to question that application. The first problem is that shingling nails that have to go through an inch of foam will n...
