We have a ranch style house build about 50 years ago. The original ceiling
insulation was fiberglass bats. The paper has all deteriorated and the
fiberglass has all compressed. Now we have about an inch of stuff between
each ceiling joist.

My plan is to blow new fiberglass in over the top of the original stuff. We
have a couple of recessed lights that I'll put some screen around. Aside
from that, it's a pretty typical S. Texas attic with heating / air vents,
wiring and galvanized water pipes.

Anything that I need to be careful about? Recommendations on how to blow it
in? Fiberglass vs. cellulose?

--
Fred.

Fred Mayfield wrote:
We have a ranch style house build about 50 years ago. The original
ceiling insulation was fiberglass bats. The paper has all deteriorated
and the fiberglass has all compressed. Now we have about an inch of
stuff between each ceiling joist.

My plan is to blow new fiberglass in over the top of the original stuff.
We have a couple of recessed lights that I'll put some screen around.
Aside from that, it's a pretty typical S. Texas attic with heating / air
vents, wiring and galvanized water pipes.

Anything that I need to be careful about? Recommendations on how to blow
it in? Fiberglass vs. cellulose?

Make sure the soffit (sp?, not in dictionary) vents don't get blocked.
Those giant-egg-carton-looking things work pretty well, as long as there
is a dam at the end of each rafter bay to keep the loose-fill from
flowing down and filling the soffit. Check with an electrical
distributor or local inspector about what is locally acceptable to put
over the light cans. It would be a bummer to fabricate something, and
have an inspector flag it as non-code come sale time.

I've been in south TX. Even in winter, this will be hot nasty work. Just
for giggles, I'd have the guy with a truck-mounted blower come by and
give a free estimate. Up here in the frozen north, fixing the venting
and adding 1400 sq. feet x 6 inches of cellulose cost me $750, and
material to do it myself would have cost at least half that, including
renting the machine. They were in and out in two hours with their big
blower. Since I didn't have a helper available to feed the little home
center machine, or crawl in the attic while I fed it, it would have
taken me all day, or more. Yeah, it was worth the extra money to avoid a
day of misery crawling around in a shallow 5-12 attic, especially since
addition has trusses and I am far from small and limber. Wish I would
have done it as soon as I moved in- just in last 14 months, I have
probably earned back half that $750 on reduced utility bills.

--
aem sends...