Insulation + Weathersealing: 7+ year project on a 1922 Bungalow

My wife and I purchased this house in 2002, and we rented it out for 5 years until we moved in in 2007. At time of purchase, the house had no insulation in the walls or basement ceiling, and only 6" of fiberglass in the attic, and there were no installed storm windows. I estimate the house would have burned 1000 gallons of oil for heat (1977 vintage boiler) that first year (had we been in the house full time, with heat on). Frighteningly, it burned about 600 gallons with the thermostat set to 50 degrees.

I insulated the attic with another 12" of fiberglass insulation, and 6" of insulation in the basement ceiling. That brought oil usage down to 700 gallons (occupied and heated).

In 2008, we insulated the walls with blown-in fiberglass and insulated the foundation above-grade basement walls with spray foam, bringing the spray foam down just over the block walls (see IMG_1428.jpg). The basement casement windows were sealed with EPDM stick-on weatherstripping (it works so well I can no longer open them, they seem sealed shut...) (see IMG_1432.jpg) and the seams between the wall plates were sealed with silicone (see IMG_1433.jpg). I also insulated the boiler to radiator supply pipes with fiberglass pipe insulation (see IMG_1425.jpg).

Next, I tackled the windows. We have double-hung windows (they are the original ones, and are in good condition. I purchased some v-strip spring bronze weatherstripping (see IMG_1413.jpg) from Kilian Hardware (http://www.kilianhardware.com/vshapsprinbr3.html) and installed it on the window jambs. From Kilian's I also purchased Stanley Storm Window Adjusters. These can also be seen in IMG_1413. They permit the storm window to be tilted open in the summer or winter, and better yet, when you swing them to the "up" position, they tighten the storm window to the jam. Not shown on the outside are the storm window hangers that makes this possible (something like this http://kilian.stores.yahoo.net/woodscreenan.html). Now, I mostly don't bother changing the screens over to storms and vice-a-versa twice/year - we just tilt open the storm windows and put a small adjustable screen in the window.

I then purchased some silicone tubeseal from Resource Conservation Technology (see http://www.conservationtechnology.com/building_weatherseals.html) along with a WS90 slot cutter blade for my router. The WS90 cuts a slot in the bottom of the window that the tubeseal fits into - it's a very nice system, and a big improvement over the stick on EPDM weatherseals that I originally installed (and that were constantly falling off). See IMG_1415 for it installed on the bottom of the window, and IMG_1416 for it pulled out of the slot a bit (for viewing of how the tubeseal fits into the slot).

After this, I had a blower door test performed - 1850 CFM at 50 pascals. That is about 10.3 ACH50. The blower door contractor told me that this was "pretty good", but there was still a lot of low hanging fruit for me to tackle, specifically the attic entrance and a basement walkout doors.

So I insulated the attic entrance. It had a nice railing around the attic opening, so I screwed 1" of foamboard around it, and gluing 1" thick pieces to that using PL300. I sealed the bottom with foam, and built a hatch of foamboard using the silicone tubeseals to create a good seal. The top is held down with gravity (a piece of 1/2" plywood on top) and sealed to the top rail with tubeseals. Bungie cords hold everything tightly together. See IMG_1424.jpg.

Then, I tackled the basement walkout barn doors. These doors were very leaky. I didn't mind them this way since my old boiler needed the air supply, and my woodstove brings in air from the basement through the old fireplace ash cleanout. But once I upgraded my boiler with a new, more efficient unit that used outside air, it was time to upgrade the sealing. These doors also sit at the bottom of an old driveway that drains a lot of water from the street, and the basement was prone to flooding now and again during extreme rain events.

First, I sealed the sides of the doors with tubeseal installed in cut slots, and I installed a new top seal, also tubesealed to the face of the doors. See IMG_1443 for the sides of the doors, and IMG_1441 for the top face seal. Where the doors meet at an overlap, I cut strips of old bicycle tire and stapled them to an appropriate thickness (the tubeseal was too thick for this). See IMG_1445. The tops of the doors fit tight with old barn door chain bolts, and help from a wooden board to force the door flush to the frame. See IMG_1447. What the doors look like closed is shown in IMG_1448. The bottom of the doors are not sealed well to the irregular concrete floor (see IMG_1450, and note the red handled toggle clamps - these are used to hold a sealing board tight to the door). After struggling for a long time to determine a good way to seal this, I decided on a face seal. I built a board cut to fit flush against the door and jamb and scribed to fit the floor. See IMG_1451 for the side that fits against the door, and IMG_1452 for it as it is ready to affix to the door. Tubeseal is used on all sides facing the door, and on the bottom (scribed) part of the board. I purchased three Grip Vertical Toggle Clamp LG (Item 34184) from Rockler Woodworking (note: they no longer carry this item) and removed the pin piece to use the full length of the clamp to hold the board tight against the door in three different places. See IMG_1453 and IMG_1454. Lastly, I have a piece of slightly bowed hickory that fits into the three door bar holders - if installed with the bow convex (facing out), then when I push it into the door bar holders, it tightly presses the doors against all of the seals. The finished assembly is shown in IMG_1456.

We've also added a Geyser heat pump water heater. Note the double layer of insulation on the pipes (I found this to be really effective in reducing heat loss) and the insulation around the pipes on top of the water heater (and yes, the TPC valve is uncovered and able to function...)

woodgeek said:

lets hear some numbers on usage!!

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Initially, 1000 gallons of oil/year (no wall insulation, no basement ceiling insulation, R-16 attic insulation.
Then, 700 gallons of oil/year (no wall insulation, R-19 basement ceiling, R-40 attic. My wife said she could feel breezes blowing through the bedroom.
Then, 550 gallons of oil.year (R-13 wall insulation, R-19 basement ceiling, R-40 attic, spray-foam on above-grade basement walls, with the temperature set to 65 degrees F.

Then, we got a woodstove. We burn about 1-1/4 to 1-1/2 full cords/year. I consider the wood we burn to be about 125-150 gallons of oil equivalent. After windows were weathersealed and attic hatch sealed, I think we took oil usage down about 30-50 gallons/year. Let's call that 375 gallons/year + 125 gallons in wood equivalent, so about 500 gallons total. It doesn't sound like a lot, but it increases the comfort a great deal, and reduced drafts. We were way more comfortable. The heat setting probably nudged up to a more normal 68 degrees F.

We started using the house part-time only in the winter. When we are not here, the thermostats are set to 50 degrees F. So, comparisons will get tough. The "not being hear full-time" temperature setback is probably equal to about another 150 gallons of oil/year. With the new boiler (about 20% oil savings compared to the old), last year we burned about 290 gallons of oil (a brutally cold winter, and one in which my wife left the temperature at >50 degrees F more than once...) plus the wood (125-150 gallons equivalent). Total usage was about 425 gallons of oil equivalent. If you added-in the temperature setback "adder", it would have been 575 gallons of oil equivalent (corrected). Like I said, brutal winter.

This year, we seem to be on track to get through the winter on one 275 gallon tank of oil. I had a Roth oil tank installed and it measures oil levels pretty accurately. So far, we've used 63 gallons of oil and we are a little less than 1/3 of our way through the winter (in degree days). We should finish at about 215 gallons of oil and 125-150 gallons of (wood) oil equivalent, or 355 gallons. Some of this is pickup from additional weathersealing (basement door) and some is from the milder (so far) winter. If you add in the temperature setup factor, that is about 505 gallons (corrected).

So, good insulation and weathersealing increases comfort and saves about 1/2 on your fuel use. Makes sense.

My goal for some time has been to get oil usage down to <1 tank per year so that I can take advantage of a one-time cash payment fill-up over the summer when prices are usually lower, and not pay the inflated mid-winter prices for a top off. By summer this year, I think heating oil might be $2.50/gallon or so, so that will essentially be my cost of heating for the whole next winter.

sloeffle said:

Any issues with stratification ( running out of hot water ) with the Geyser hooked to the Marathon ?

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None at all. My plumber connected the Geyser to the Marathon with a loop - it pulls from the bottom and returns to the top, so it does a good job of avoiding stratification. This is a nice setup since I keep the Geyser at 120-125 degrees F, and the entire tank is essentially at this temperature.