Cellulose Insulation

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1

Over this 3 day weekend I decided to insulate my house with the blown in cellulose stuff.

The house is prett small, and built in the late teens, balloon construction with nothing at all in the walls. About a year and half ago, I tore down the plaster and lathe boards and put fiberglass in one of the walls. It was such a mess that I decided to blow the stuff in and then just drywall over the existing plaster.

Here is how things have gone.

Machine from Home Depot was pretty awesome, and the people said that there would be no trouble filling the walls. I quickly found that the machine only comes with houses that are about 3" in diameter and are made for blowing the stuff into attics.

A quick trip to the interweb and I find that there is a reducer, basically a nozzle that you are supposed to attach to the end of the hose. Drill a 1" hole in the wall, insert nozzle, run the machine until the wall cavity is full and you are done.

I called around to see if anyone had the wall nozzle. No luck, and severl people at both Lowes and Home Depot told me “You can’t fill walls with that machine.” I had to sacrifice on old funnel, but I made a nozzle, duct taped it to the end of the hose and went to town.

I bought 20 bags to start, then an additional 10, I have 8 left and part of the upstairs to do, plus the attic.

The worst part is drilling the holes and the machine makes a ton of dust. It is best left outside, but my basement is a piece of crap so I just threw it in there and run 2 box fans with furnace filters in front of them to cut the dust.

I did this from the inside out, and it has made some mess, but it has made a dramatic difference already.

2

cool . i need to to this also.

3

So what do you estimate it cost you for the machine rental and the insulation? I have a house that was built in the 50s and I need to insulate it after I rewire it.

4

good decision. can’t go wrong with insulation

5

The machine is Free for 2 days if you buy 20 bags. If you dont have the machine back to the store in 48 hours they charge you $40 per day. I needed the machine for 3 days, so 2 Free days + 1 day @ $40 = $40 for machine rental

My attic is 480 square feet. I need 12 bags for the attic. This will give me an R value of 19 after the insulation is blown in and is 5" deep.

My house is 32x15, 2 story, open walls. I got the original 20 bags, used them and went back for 10 more. So I used 30 bags for the walls.

12 for the attic + 30 for the walls = 42 bags @ $8.34 = $350

Additonal costs:

Dusk masks, I used 4 a day for 3 days. 2 in a pack @ $4.00 a pack = $24

Hole Saw x 4 @ $10.00 each. Plus a new Arbor @ $10.00 =$50

I would say i have another $50 in miscellaneous crap like trash bags, duct tape, my funnel mod for the blowing machine.

I talked to a guy that does this for a living. He didn’t recommend this as a DYI project mainly because “the machines don’t have enough force to pack the insulation in the wall tight enough”. I followed the tips at the manufacturers web site and didn’t have any problems. I pulled away a section of the wall and saw that the insulation was packed very well and that was from filling at 8’. The manufacturer recommends drilling several holes from the floor to ceiling and filling from the bottom up. The pros fill from the outside in, usually taking off a row or 2 of siding, drilling the holes and then blowing the stuff in.

I have about $510 in the project and probably saved a solid $1500 in labor costs. Insulation also qualifies for tax credit. I will get the $350 as credit on my 07 taxes and the gas bill should be considerably lower.

The Insulation Manfucturer

6

Thanks for the update. The only problem that I have is that most of my house is brick so I’ll have to insulate from the inside.

7

Excellent! Glad to hear you’re building a cozy nest to live in.

8

Thanks so much for posting this! I to need to do this. This was the first winter in the house, so now I have a baseline. I just need to probe to see if there are fire blocks or anything in the walls, then start going to town. I don’t really care if it doesn’t pack it super tight, any insulation is better than none at this point.

chris

9

That’s the truth.