This is sort of linked to another thread I started about my upstairs being hot in the summer which lead me to eventually starting a project of air sealing and adding to the insulation R-value. Am just kicking the tires, not something I'd do till the fall when its cooler and if I had the funding for it. But I did some recon LN against my better judgement (it was hot up their, came down soaked) just to get some sort of a game plan and what I'd need. Turns out I have a tad better insulation down than I thought but what I saw raised some questions on how I'd add insulation up there and tackle this project. From the pic's below you can see there looks to be some sort of kraft paper down 1st, followed by some loose what looks to be some type of wool insulation, followed by a thin batt of insulation, then finally a fiberglass batt with the kraft paper facing up towards the roof. Having trouble wrapping my head around how to tackle this without making a nightmare DIY project of having to remove all this loose fill and perhaps re-using the batt insulation. Originally I thought I only had fiberglass batt insulation, I was going to flip it so the kraft paper was facing down and add on top but now am at a loss. I am going to have to remove at least temporarily so I can properly air seal any gaps or holes but do I discard the loose insulation and the thin batt of insulation and go with my original plan or keep in place and add to it? Open to advice and suggestions and as always appreciate everyone's feedback and time! I may add a gable vent fan in time as well, this gable vent is above my room and my daughters room which gets so dang hot.
Arghhh do it your sellers who do not understand vapor barrier that barrier on bottom grey in color; is a vapor barrier and designed to hold layer above it.. They should have used un-faced pink above it.. I assume in south Jersey you have high humidity 2 vapor barrier cause headaches.. If you look to your eves you can see daylight; so if you add insulation you will need to put in an air channel because color air is supposed to come up from bottom and go out ridge or gable vents. Look like this then before adding more insulation pull paper off pink.. Since your trying to get rid of heat put another gable vent in on other side first for cross ventilation 24 is your pink very low r value for attic added; you should be able pop a second vent on other side if not there at 4 am easy enough do outside in shade later. Assuming you don’t have 2 because of stated temps
Thanks Canadian border VT sincerely appreciated !!! They seemed to have done this with all the older homes built in this area, seems to have been done by the builder. My old home had the SAME thing, kraft paper facing up. At that home I had hired someone to do it part of state energy program with my new furnace & A/C. They had (or at least they told me) slashed the kraft paper and blew insulation over it What you said confirms everything I've always understood and read about. Good idea just pulling it off, and re-using. In any event it's going to be a rough project. Did I mention half the attic has particle board installed as flooring on top of the insulation? That stuff is a nightmare..........I've had to pull some of it up prior to run some electrical . If I can get this gable vent off it would be a time saver to throw all this out the vent vs transporting up and down attic steps. I plan on adding vent baffles for sure as I might decide to blow insulation in and do not want to block that for sure. I do have two gable vents one on each side but it just get's dam hot up there.
ok you have 2 gable vents; bet you don’t have ridge vent. So let say your house 36 feet long your soffit vents full length 4 inches wide. That’s 24 sq. Ft trying to go out 2 gable vents.. explains heat
Hello I installed R4 reflectix foil in the attic crawl space floor and in the rafters over the proper vents which made the house 10 degrees cooler in the summer. See my story with pics in this thread. Insulation I also ripped down some 2x4s to 2x2s and nailed them to the 2x4s in the attic floor to create 2x6s and ripped out the old R7 paper backed insulation and installed R19. I then laid boards over it in the middle to create storage for the house and then crisscrossed the sides with R30 to create R53 to keep the house a little warmer in the winter.
