My Acreage Project - Let the fun begin

[schurchill39]

I'm sure with all these pictures you will be able to look back and see where conduits are but if you're not already doing it it might be a good idea to draw yourself a reference map with measurements to find everything once its boarded up. That was a big lesson for me from my first basement to my second basement, I thought pictures would be good enough but they weren't. For my second basement I had a map as well as pictures with measurements drawn on studs for things like additional blocking for TV's or floating shelves.

[Darkane]

https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-...3fcQxpF-X2.jpg

That picture pipe in a pipe for inlet air preheat exchange?

[eblend]

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I'm sure with all these pictures you will be able to look back and see where conduits are but if you're not already doing it it might be a good idea to draw yourself a reference map with measurements to find everything once its boarded up. That was a big lesson for me from my first basement to my second basement, I thought pictures would be good enough but they weren't. For my second basement I had a map as well as pictures with measurements drawn on studs for things like additional blocking for TV's or floating shelves.

Yah, I will do measurements and records before they close it up. I was actually thinking of doing a 3D scan service, where they basically walk around with walls opened and you can "Google Street View" throughout your house with measurements and crap, but I don't got time for that, so gonna do it old-school way.

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https://photos.smugmug.com/photos/i-...3fcQxpF-X2.jpg

That picture pipe in a pipe for inlet air preheat exchange?

I am not sure that's the intention, it's just a concentric vent. Being that it's a high efficiency furnace, I don't think the air coming out is very hot at all. Here is a diagram of this. Exhaust is down the center, intake is around the sides.

[eblend]

Well the spray foam guy showed up yesterday, and to my surprise basically said that he has cleared his schedule for next two weeks to work on my house continuously. Yesterday he finished spraying the garage, so I can now move in all my junk into here to be out of his and drywallers way. There is a lot of foam going into this place, so it will take him a while to finish up. I didn't expect it out so soon, so this is a pleasant surprise. Can see some old foam vs new foam. UV already discolored the old foam.

[ExtraSlow]

Spray foam makes me horny. Love it.

[eblend]

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Spray foam makes me horny. Love it.

Here is some more new content for you.....got to keep it fresh

Guy will be there for a while still....lots to go.























Intersting frostlines on the roof in sprayed vs. unsprayed areas:



Aside from that, just prepping things I need before drywall.

Doggie shower base built out



Water filtration bypass valves installed (can run water straight from well or divert to filtration, to come)



And started on doing trim around the garage doors. They fked up installing these and didn't add any space for future drywall to trim this out nicely, so I had some custom metal trim made and started the install yesterday. Massive pain in the ass, but end result is worth it. There is a secondary trim that will go on top and allow the drywall to finish off nicely, but that's later. The spacing issue is at the top of the door and not captured in this pictures, and short of moving the door in too deep and not sealing properly, this was the easiest solution.

Before:



After:

[prae]

@eblend you like your sprayfoam guys? Ive got a garage to insulate this summer. DM me their info if so

[03ozwhip]

I wish I would have done spray foam on the shop. I'm too cheap lol

[eblend]

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@eblend you like your sprayfoam guys? Ive got a garage to insulate this summer. DM me their info if so

Let me check with him today if he is okay to be contacted directly or not. I am using him via another contact, so he is a sub-contractor for an acquaintance of mine who works at a stucco company. If he is okay for direct contact, I will get his contact details, if not, I will send you my other contact, and he can arrange for it. The spray foam guy is actually a brother-in-law for my contact, and they are both super solid and reliable guys to deal with, highly recommended. Will get back to you. This guy has been spraying for 16 years now.

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I wish I would have done spray foam on the shop. I'm too cheap lol

It's not about being cheap even, it's a financial commitment haha, you have to really want it and understand it's benefits to make this commitment. I think I mentioned this before, but all in, it's roughly $90k in foam for this house, including the foam under the pad. I could have bought a pretty sweet car for that price...but I am confident in the long term it will pay off as my heating/cooling bills will be much smaller and pay off for the foam over time. We plan on staying here for rest of our lives, so it may just pay for itself before we drop dead With the way inflation is going, perhaps much sooner.

[ExtraSlow]

90k in foam is a great investment. Will make the place so comfortable.

[Gman.45]

eBlend, keep these updates coming please. Great pictures, I was going to ask about the contact deets for this sprayer too, but it won't be until next year, so I'll remember and mark this thread in my calendar that far ahead. First thing I thought seeing the pics is that this guy does really good work. You also answered the questions on the cost(ish) already for building a new place, or even for a new attached garage/hanger space. Love this thread, it's ones like these why I've kept up with Beyond since I first came in 2005 when a guy at the dirt bike track in Calgary told me it was a good place to locally sell the 2 ipod's I'd won one day, hah hah. Car stuff is cool, but now, it's this sort of info-tainment I come here for.

[ThePenIsMightier]

Awesome.

What happens in the corners where the framing makes it seemingly too tight to get foam in? I was worried about these in my place and never got a firm answer. I would guess there's a large triangular void in corners like these:

[arcticcat522]

You should have the framers, frame it better. Not sure what they do now that its done

[JfuckinC]

https://www.canadiantire.ca/en/pdp/g...p.0642617.html

[schurchill39]

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You should have the framers, frame it better. Not sure what they do now that its done

Framers frame it better? All the spray foam guys will do is put a thin tip on their gun and fill it up like the "Great Stuff" foam cans. They likely leave all of those crevices until the end of the job and then set up their gun and blend to get in the tight spots and hit them all.

[eblend]

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eBlend, keep these updates coming please. Great pictures, I was going to ask about the contact deets for this sprayer too, but it won't be until next year, so I'll remember and mark this thread in my calendar that far ahead. First thing I thought seeing the pics is that this guy does really good work. You also answered the questions on the cost(ish) already for building a new place, or even for a new attached garage/hanger space. Love this thread, it's ones like these why I've kept up with Beyond since I first came in 2005 when a guy at the dirt bike track in Calgary told me it was a good place to locally sell the 2 ipod's I'd won one day, hah hah. Car stuff is cool, but now, it's this sort of info-tainment I come here for.

To give you an idea of costs, my initial quote was from Beyond Foam and it was $30k more than I got from my guy, and he is a solid hard worker. He has been there every single day since the spray started, arriving at just before 7AM and going straight. I never seen him eat.....haha. He said many people love the idea of sprayfoam, but don't like the cost, so he doesn't advertise much, because he has lots of work already and doesn't want to waste time giving people quotes if they aren't serious, as only like 1 in 20 pans out. PM me when you are ready and I will provide you his contact.

He is one of the dudes who volunteered his time and skill to this nightmare that happened 3 years ago, and was there every single day working the job for free. He introduces himself in this video. Very solid guy, don't hear me say that about too many people, especially contractors.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAbf9ZiY_ug

This was the original new story about the mess that was left behind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhUwcF9WPD0

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Awesome.

What happens in the corners where the framing makes it seemingly too tight to get foam in? I was worried about these in my place and never got a firm answer. I would guess there's a large triangular void in corners like these:

In this case, in picture 1, I actually realized this problem early on, and when framing, made sure to screw it in place for it to be removable. When the guy first came out to do my utility room a few months ago, I specifically asked him to fill that cavity, so that I could put the wood back in and resume work, so that particular space was filled long before the rest of the work that is being done now.

In picture 2, there is actually no cavity there, it's just shadows. It's like a quad 2x6 beam that forms the corner of the house. There is rigid foam insulation on the outside under the sheathing that protects that corner. Basically the whole wall is made of 2x8s, but the corner is formed from 2x6s to allow for 2" of rigid insulation on the outside. That was done long before and was part of the original building plans. I didn't make that decision, was part of the original engineering.

But generally speaking, you have to make space available for foam to get into. They can spray into the cavity a bit, but you want foam to land perpendicular to the surface, else it kind of slides off and doesn't really stick to the surface uniformly. I have a few places where there is dropped ceilings and he had to spray up into a cavity, in those cases he just filled it full basically with foam. When doing an entire place, the guy will be out there multiple times, so when I was doing mine, in December I had him spray the few hard spots along with the garage (to give him a full days of work), and then didn't start the full spray until about 3 months later. If you plan it right, you can get those spots filled ahead of time basically.

They can also use open-cell foam, and I was just chatting with him about it. With that, they can basically find a hole, shove a gun into it, pull the trigger, and wait for it to come out of everywhere and shave off the excess, but open-cell foam isn't a vapor barrier like closed-cell foam, so if it was an exterior wall, would have to put poly as well.


Here is another thing I had done that I heard good things about. Getting underneath the stairs sprayed. Whis foam sticks to shit like crazy, so doing the underside of stairs basically glues everything together, preventing stairs from creaking in the long run.





This is the foam that they used on mine. In total he is planning on using 10 sets of foam Part A and Part B, so total of 20 barrels, each at 243KG, basically half a ton for a set...that's a lot of foam..



And another random picture, love how smooth it looks. Foam really pretties things up.

[eblend]

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You should have the framers, frame it better. Not sure what they do now that its done

This is the reason why I love doing this place myself. I think through everything before hand, and make sure that it's not a problem. If this was just a builder built home, they would jerry rig something and call it a day. I had one cavity that was very tight, and it was actually packed with batt foam from factory (walls came pre-assembled). I removed the batts from there and cut a 2x8 down to a 2x4 (it's not load bearing), to allow space for foam. After the foam was done, I simply re-attached the part of the wood I earlier cut out, as it's placement was needed for drywall backing.

I actually had a chat about this yesterday with the foam guy as well. They can only legally spray after framing inspection has passed, and to pass framing inspection you need all your other inspections passed as well (Gas, electrical, plumbing, hvac). Obviously this isn't very realistic in all situations, especially with builders, so often they would have him come out and spray something, and then later go and dig out the foam or put holes in it for plumbing or venting ect. This is pretty normal procedure in a building industry where someone else is doing all the work and you have to juggle multiple trades, but when you are your own tradesman, you can pre-plan much better and get a better end product. In my instance, I had every single house penetration completed before the foam guy got there, so all of my penetrations are fully sealed. It's a lot of stress to think of everything, and takes a long time, but not having to cut through foam and knowing it's perfectly sealed around everything is very satisfying and makes it all worth it.

[arcticcat522]

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Framers frame it better? All the spray foam guys will do is put a thin tip on their gun and fill it up like the "Great Stuff" foam cans. They likely leave all of those crevices until the end of the job and then set up their gun and blend to get in the tight spots and hit them all.

[arcticcat522]

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This is the reason why I love doing this place myself. I think through everything before hand, and make sure that it's not a problem. If this was just a builder built home, they would jerry rig something and call it a day. I had one cavity that was very tight, and it was actually packed with batt foam from factory (walls came pre-assembled). I removed the batts from there and cut a 2x8 down to a 2x4 (it's not load bearing), to allow space for foam. After the foam was done, I simply re-attached the part of the wood I earlier cut out, as it's placement was needed for drywall backing.

I actually had a chat about this yesterday with the foam guy as well. They can only legally spray after framing inspection has passed, and to pass framing inspection you need all your other inspections passed as well (Gas, electrical, plumbing, hvac). Obviously this isn't very realistic in all situations, especially with builders, so often they would have him come out and spray something, and then later go and dig out the foam or put holes in it for plumbing or venting ect. This is pretty normal procedure in a building industry where someone else is doing all the work and you have to juggle multiple trades, but when you are your own tradesman, you can pre-plan much better and get a better end product. In my instance, I had every single house penetration completed before the foam guy got there, so all of my penetrations are fully sealed. It's a lot of stress to think of everything, and takes a long time, but not having to cut through foam and knowing it's perfectly sealed around everything is very satisfying and makes it all worth it.

This place is built great, don't get me wrong. This is a minor thing that you can get figured out. Looks like the spray foam can squeeze in there. Love the updates and seeing this move forward. Also, I'm not a framer...or house builder....

[eblend]

For completion, found an early picture of how my corners are done. Can see the rigid foam on the outside corners, helps with thermal conductivity in such a large open space.