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Skimmed the last 20 pages and didn’t see this come up so: Old uninsulated house, want to get a ductless mini split with say 3 zones, ground floor living room/dining room, upstairs office, upstairs master bed. Live in the northeast so 95° days are about the most I currently see. Goal is to cool the rooms I use the most with less energy usage and noise than a window unit in each space. Do I care about brand these days? The reading I’ve done seems to uniformly talk about Mitsubishis as the best of the best but I don’t know that I need cutting edge.
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Oct 17, 2023 17:10
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 02:25 |
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H110Hawk posted:Can you insulate and air seal first? Or is that out of the question for your construction style? Because that will pay for itself in conditioning costs after one maaaaaaybe two years. Depending on how bad it is literally 1 winter can pay for it in reduced energy bills. To my understanding fixing that in one fell swoop would mean pulling trim and demoing plaster and lathe on nearly all the exterior walls and the (finished) attic ceiling, doing the work (plus whatever else needs done while the walls are open, various electric things and running Pex for the radiators) and buttoning it all up. That seems like more disruption to the livability of the house than I can tolerate if I DIY and out of my budget to pay a guy for. Right now I’ve been insulating spaces as I can make work happen in them, which admittedly is frustratingly slow.
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Oct 18, 2023 13:35
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FISHMANPET posted:What's your exterior wall situation? Have you talked to an insulation contractor, or even better, had an energy audit done on your house? We had wall insulation blown into the outer walls from the outside. We have vinyl siding so they were able to peel that back, drill holes in the sheathing, and blow insulation into the walls that way, and then cover the holes and reapply the siding. Zero inside damage. And it all started with a home energy audit, for us done by a partnership between the gas and electricity company. Brick on the ground floor and cedar shake up top. I haven't really looked into an audit since there seems to be a lot of obvious stuff to be done. the yeti fucked around with this message at 14:44 on Oct 18, 2023 |
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Oct 18, 2023 14:42
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Motronic posted:You should absolutely be looking at loose fill blown in from the outside. Word. I had the impression that wasn't a thing for old brick houses but I can certainly look into it.
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Oct 18, 2023 15:00
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Motronic posted:They typically drill a 2-3" hole at the top and bottom of each stud bay. They can core drill the bricks and replace the cores or perhaps even remove bricks and put them back in (you'd likely need a mason to do this for them). They can also do this from the inside but it's messier for you. Patching the plaster is no big deal because it's just small holes. How annoying this will be also depends on if you can match the color/wanted to paint that wall anyway. Still gonna look into the energy audit and find a local insulation outfit but curious the thread's thoughts too since it occurred to me later--how's blow in insulation intersect with knowing down the road you're gonna need to get into some walls? (in my case, mix of old plaster, electrical updates, radiator plumbing) do you just call 'em back to redo a couple stud bays or what?
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Oct 19, 2023 02:16
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Thanks y’all. Turns out the utility atraight up pays for the audit so I don’t even have to pay out of pocket and then go file a rebate. Do we talk about radiator plumbing in here or the plumbing thread?
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Oct 25, 2023 12:36
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the yeti posted:Thanks y’all. Turns out the utility atraight up pays for the audit so I don’t even have to pay out of pocket and then go file a rebate. Had that done today, got some good info I think. The guy noted a couple things besides the insulation issues I already am working on: - Put weather stripping around my crawlspace access door (and also on the attic door until I get tthe attic insulated) - Insulate the rim joist with foam board and expanding foam (the internet seems to this is commonly done so I'm guessing there's no danger of sealing up water against the joist here) These ones kinda made me raise an eyebrow: - Consider insulating basement hot water pipes less to heat basement air more - Don't insulate the basement ceiling, so any heat in the basement can rise into house (plan was 1/4" fan fold foam Motronic and I were discussing somewhere else) Those last two seem like they would only make sense in a finished block wall basement with below grade insulation. There's no chance of treating the air in a sandstone wall basement in the northeast as part of the conditioned air envelope of the house right?
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Nov 2, 2023 23:25
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The dust comment makes me wonder if the realtor is confusing the energy used with it having electrostatic dust control or something.
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Nov 12, 2023 05:11
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MRC48B posted:Yeah that realtor is clueless. the furnace is probably gas/oil with an electrostatic dust collector. I would assume the collector…..thingies? Electrodes? Need cleaning like crazy too right?
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Nov 12, 2023 15:37
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Insulation getting blown into my walls rn and I’m so loving happy about it
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Dec 11, 2023 18:42
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H110Hawk posted:Awesome! Enjoy it coming out of the seams of your house for years to come. (At least, any time I opened up something a poof of it would come out.) Future me can simply refer to past me’s energy bills if he gets salty about the poo poo going everywhere doing work in the walls. Now I just gotta do the rim joists and (in spring) the attic.
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Dec 11, 2023 19:14
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GoonyMcGoonface posted:I can't imagine Rheem would be OK with the HVAC techs putting in a warranty request to replace the entire control unit, ECU, and motor all at the same time That’s between the techs, their boss, and Rheem tbh. It’s new and you shouldn’t have to do their dx work for them.
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Dec 23, 2023 17:08
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House is warm so either this buzzing just started or it’s not impeding furnace function. To my ear this sounds like a relay making GBS threads the bed but I’m open to suggestions. https://i.imgur.com/Fcn3smA.mp4   Edit- I should say I’m comfortable messing with discrete parts with some guidance so I’d much rather that then call someone. the yeti fucked around with this message at 01:24 on Jan 24, 2024 |
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Jan 24, 2024 01:21
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Motronic posted:Sounds like the gas valve. Give it some light percussive maintenance and see if that clears it up. If it does, it's time to order a replacement to have on hand. MRC48B posted:use the mechanics stethescope trick and narrow it down to find the exact source of the buzzing noise. You guys are gonna loving love this: https://i.imgur.com/2FMo0Za.mp4 I swear on my life standing right there it sounds like it’s coming from the furnace until you’re standing between the bike and the furnace  I twigged to it going down to tap the gas valve as suggested and the pitch changed when I bumped the bike.
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Jan 25, 2024 14:51
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 02:25 |
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This is air handling related so I figured I'd ask here first: Old house, ground floor is hardwood directly on joists, no subfloor, basement is mortared sandstone. Between these two things the basement and everything in it accumulates fine dust pretty quickly and I'm wondering if I have any good options to remedy that (besides 'redo the floors and finish the basement walls') I could run a furnace filter/ box fan cube 24/7 but I feel like I'd run though a shitload of money in filters. I suppose I could titrate down to the coarsest/cheapest type of filter that mitigates this particular selection of dust but I'm wondering if there's a better option. Motivation here is largely to keep everything from getting filthy quite as fast, with allergies as a secondary concern.
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Feb 7, 2024 15:51
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