I purchased a 100 year old, recently remodeled home several months ago. It's a 1.5 story shotgun style house. The second story has a bedroom and a full bathroom. It has a relatively small unfinished attic space, where I am in the process of adding a walk in closet. I have read many threads on insulation and followed links to outside sources and read those, so I'm in the process of learning what I can about proper insulation, but I still have quite a few questions.
The entire house appears to have been insulated using rolls of fiberglass R-13 and R-19. As far as I can tell, the exterior walls were done with R13, but there is R19 in random places. I can't discern if there is a method to where the R-19 is vs. the R-13, but the house is built with a mix of original studs (2x5??) and newer 2x4s. I get the feeling that the insulation job done by the remodelers wasn't stellar, but the half story/attic space is really bad.
I've gutted the bathroom upstairs and it appears as though the ceiling in the side attic is insulated w/ R-13, and the knee walls aren't insulated at all. The 'ceiling' upstairs is a strip that's about 1 foot across ( /-\ ). There is recessed lighting there, and the remodelers simply did not insulate at all in the top attic, leaving a large amount of space uninsulated. A side note - there is a large faux vent on one wall that simply leads to the side attic...maybe someone can explain that, or tell me it needs to be filled. Another observation I had is that there is no insulation on the "floor" of the side attic, above the downstairs ceiling.
The unfinished area in the attic has loose insulation between the floor joists, but it can't be much more than 5" deep. There is no insulation between the ceiling joists. It doesn't appear as though the soffits are vented. There is one gable vent. I am in the process of adding a ~4x8 closet in this space, leaving side attic space on either side and about 3 ft. between the back wall of the closet and the front of the house (where the gable vent is).
After all that description, my question is what steps do I need to take in order to correct the existing insulation and how do I best insulate the unfinished space as I build the closet? It gets very hot upstairs while the downstairs stays very comfortable. Money is an issue, so if I can do this myself it would be preferable. The biggest issues I see are insulating the top attic without tearing down drywall and without getting near the recessed fixtures. I hope my description makes sense and thanks for reading through all of this. Any thoughts or advice concerning how to go about this and what type(s) of insulation to use are greatly appreciated.
The entire house appears to have been insulated using rolls of fiberglass R-13 and R-19. As far as I can tell, the exterior walls were done with R13, but there is R19 in random places. I can't discern if there is a method to where the R-19 is vs. the R-13, but the house is built with a mix of original studs (2x5??) and newer 2x4s. I get the feeling that the insulation job done by the remodelers wasn't stellar, but the half story/attic space is really bad.
I've gutted the bathroom upstairs and it appears as though the ceiling in the side attic is insulated w/ R-13, and the knee walls aren't insulated at all. The 'ceiling' upstairs is a strip that's about 1 foot across ( /-\ ). There is recessed lighting there, and the remodelers simply did not insulate at all in the top attic, leaving a large amount of space uninsulated. A side note - there is a large faux vent on one wall that simply leads to the side attic...maybe someone can explain that, or tell me it needs to be filled. Another observation I had is that there is no insulation on the "floor" of the side attic, above the downstairs ceiling.
The unfinished area in the attic has loose insulation between the floor joists, but it can't be much more than 5" deep. There is no insulation between the ceiling joists. It doesn't appear as though the soffits are vented. There is one gable vent. I am in the process of adding a ~4x8 closet in this space, leaving side attic space on either side and about 3 ft. between the back wall of the closet and the front of the house (where the gable vent is).
After all that description, my question is what steps do I need to take in order to correct the existing insulation and how do I best insulate the unfinished space as I build the closet? It gets very hot upstairs while the downstairs stays very comfortable. Money is an issue, so if I can do this myself it would be preferable. The biggest issues I see are insulating the top attic without tearing down drywall and without getting near the recessed fixtures. I hope my description makes sense and thanks for reading through all of this. Any thoughts or advice concerning how to go about this and what type(s) of insulation to use are greatly appreciated.
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