Saturday, March 13, 2010

Attic "blown in" insulation job




Ben volunteered to help with this job---as he has one scheduled for Monday, and he wanted to practice. There is this cool video on the corning insulation site where they make it look easy. If you purchase 10 bags of insulation, then you rent the machine for "free" (deposit/refund) and the machine fits in the back of our minivan even with its 30 feet of hose, cords, and two pieces. Ben and I had picked up 20 bags of insulation, and the plywood for the catwalk, and the respirator a few weeks ago when he had time on a rainy day. Ben had his first day off in about three weeks today, as his work had picked up. Bob had the boards all cut and ready to lay down. It was a beautiful day. The insulation gets a little messy, and the machine fluffs it with air, and pieces blow about, but Bob has a shop vac, so he got most of it all picked up. (I do laundry in that same garage---so I am a bit picky about clean floors). Hauling the wood up to the attic was the hard part, and then once they got the hang of it, Ben ran the hose in the attic, while Bob fed the machine with 12 bags and our attic looks like it snowed pink up there. Ought to be quieter. And we should see a savings on our heating and AC bills. And Bob says we can deduct the cost of materials from next years income taxes. We have been needing to do this for years, as our house was built in the sixties, and the insulation had been pushed down.

Such a relief to get it done, and the machine back to Home Depo, and the space to put the car in the garage if we have another hail storm. We had one last week, and the hail stones were marble size---bigger than peas, and they came down hard and fast. They bounced in the backyard about a foot high.

And tonight is the time change "spring forward" already. Yikes.

4 comments:

Bag Blog said...

Do you think that the insulation people take old Toyotas, grind them up and make insulation out of them?

joyce said...

yes! I sure thought of y'all when they were doing the insulation. Will y'all be doing the roll kind or blown in kind for your new addition? Bet you got lots done today as it was a beautiful day!

Bag Blog said...

We did get lots done this weekend - I'm sore. We will probably have someone come blow the insulation in. We are still working on the windows, doors and siding stuff. We started the wireing too.

joyce said...

Bob is sore, too. And I put first aid cream on his head where he bonked it on the rafters a few times. The estimates we got on the phone were $500 for 1000 square feet. This is what we ended up paying for materials, and the machine rental was "free" with buying at least 10 bales.