Bestway Cellulose Insulation

The back area of the house was not on the original gut remodel list. But several upgrades have been made. The crawl space was conditioned early in our thermal envelope work. Completed Crawlspace! The attic above was layered with all the extra fiberglass that was still in good condition when taken from the slab area deconstruction. The entire hallway is included in the original reinsulation with Roxul rockwool because the roof extended that far. The bathroom was remodeled so the rear wall was reinsulated.

Hall Fire alarm before drywall
Hall before drywall

But we did not want to remove and replace all the drywall to reinsulate the rear. We were willing to hire a level 2 thermographer to document the existing insulation which we knew to be fiberglass batt fill same as the rest of the house. I knew the corners were colder from my own thermography so eventually after I had heard so many good things about Bestway Insulation and their dense pack cellulose, I decided to have the rear of the house reinsulated. This will eliminate the need for a thermographer who has completed level 2 training and has been impossible to find.

The Bestway crew arrived with their truck in mid-January during a relatively warm spell.

Bestway truck at the back door
Bestway truck at the back door

The process was to drill hose nozzle sized holes in the drywall and pump the cellulose into the wall cavities. We were fortunate because the wall cavities were not blocked so one hole sufficed for the whole cavity.

Dense packing with hose
Dense packing with hose

The design of the house is a bit unusual regarding outside walls. There are half walls over the buried concrete walls and these are deeeper than 6”, there is a clerestory wall but only to the attic area and there is one full wall in the end bedroom.

The holes in all these areas were sealed with foam to maintain the vapor barrier and then patched with drywall.

Sealing and replacing drywall cuts
Sealing and replacing drywall cuts

Both the walls and the ceiling were insulated in the “Red” middle bedroom and just the walls in the end bedroom because there is attic above. Then there was a lot of vacuuming to clean up the spilled insulation. But the workers both removed and returned boxes to the shelves which was appreciated.

Drywall cuts replaced
Drywall cuts replaced

I took a couple of Flir thermal images with the new insulation and a very cold 13 degree temperature outside. Although there are lighter and darker areas in the thermal photo indicating difference in temperature, there is only a difference of near 7 degrees from point to point measured. The room temperature at the thermostat was 64 degrees.

Annotated Flir image after dense pack
Annotated Flir image after dense pack
Flir image after dense pack
Flir image after dense pack

I had a before photo of this spot but unfortunately didn’t annotate it. This is from October of 2015 just after the new windows were installed.

Attic Wall Leak
Red bedroom temp difference at back wall

Having the insulation reinforced with dense pack seemed like a good next step. I would also like to replace the radiators in this part of the house with underfloor radiant. I have plenty of HePex pipe left for this project just need to get to it eventually.

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