Electric water heater timer

[xpc]

It was built in 1883, all original windows and door (we replaced one door with an energy star steel door)... about 900 square feet... originally it was built as a rooming house for sawmill workers in the area.

Generally these types of old rooming / farm houses had small wall openings from the room with the wood burner into all the other rooms including ceiling vents to the upstairs. What does yours have besides the stairwell? is that open?

There is no foundation under the kitchen, and it is sinking so will be torn off and rebuilt after weatherproofing the main house. The woodstove is in the far end of the kitchen, so that room would be around 40C degrees when the rest of the house is comfortable... even with the wood burning most of the baseboards stay on a lot of the time.

So does that means the wood stove is in the single story annex? has the original 2 story chimney been abandoned and sealed? Cutting a hole high on the wall between the kitchen and main house and installing one of those low profile window fans would probably solve that 104F degrees problem. I can't recommend it though because most newer building codes don't allow you to force wood heat into sleeping areas. Having multiple smoke and monoxide detectors are highly encouraged, I have one in every room.

The space underneath the main house is a crawl space (half is barely deep enough to get under the house, half has been dug out and holds potato bins, our well pump, and lots of mud). The stone foundation has holes large enough to stick your arm through.

As is mine, I bought 1" polyisocyanate foam boards (4'x8' = $15) and cut into strip and mounted around the foundation wall using 3' metal fence poles. My floors are much warmer now - just remove and store once spring comes.

There was blown in insulation in the walls, but that has settled so the bottom 2 feet of each wall is insulated and nothing else is. There is blown in insulation in the attics, but it is less than 6 inches thick and really not adequate.

Hard to believe it settled that low without getting really wet. I too put cellulose in all my outside walls and even built a sub-wall in my stove room with twice the insulation.

This is where our water heater is, although that stove has been replaced with an airtight heating stove:

If the new stove is not getting it's combustion air from a dedicated outside vent you may want to try cracking a window in the kitchen so as not to pull cold air through the rest of the house. Warning if you don't allow enough air infiltration the wood stove will deplete your oxygen.

Since you are spending $800 a month with likely more than half on the electric baseboard heaters I would hunker down and buy $500 worth of rolled fiberglass R19 unfaced attic batts and insulate both of the attics, when you tear down the annex just move the rolls to the main attic for R40 up there. I would also insulate the foundation as said before.

 

[Mackay]

We put R30 in our ceiling and I would recommend that if you can fit it in, but hey, R40 is better if you can do it.

 

[xpc]

We put R30 in our ceiling and I would recommend that if you can fit it in, but hey, R40 is better if you can do it.

The Department of Energy recommends R38 here in Kentucky and R49 in Wisconsin and they are north of that yet. Most FHA loans will not allow a home sale/purchase if not at those levels.

The two roofs looks like it should be able to fit the 6" batts in them and should accommodate the other 6" batt when they tear off the kitchen addition and move that insulation into the main roof - gotta save money and also why I didn't recommend cellulose even though it is a better choice.

 

[hwillm1977]

The attic above the main house is almost 5 feet high at the peak, so I'm sure we could fit that amount of insulation in there.

I think the real reason the insulation has settled (some walls have NO insulation in them at all) is that the elderly woman who lived here previously was on social assistance, she had the insulation done as part of a welfare program... I think whatever company did it was not so ethical and did only enough to get their money from the government. There are holes drilled in the outside walls for blown-in insulation in the walls that don't contain any, and none of the holes had been sealed up or covered over so I'm sure the rain did get in there... but there isn't any mold in the walls (that we have found anyway). The insulation was put in in 1982, if that makes any difference.

The two story chimney is not actually two stories... it enters the second floor and is propped up by 2 2x4's in the main bedroom closet... it will be taken down this year, but is stuffed with styrofoam insulation (blue R5/inch sheets, I think it's extruded foam?)... the kitchen chimney (the one story section) has been taken out and replaced with Selkirk pipe for the wood stove.

The stairwell is open (it's beside the front, main door of the house), and there are two grates, one in the front room, one in the middle room of the house that allow air flow upstairs... they used to have a woodstove in THREE of the rooms of the house, so the grates are where we removed the old stove pipes, but left the holes in the floors

$800 was our largest bill... since we have done some insulating, and have the woodstove running more our largest bill (this month) was $530... a huge improvement.

Can we roll out batts of fibreglass on top of the cellulose that is in the attics now? and if so, do we need to increase ventilation (right now the end gable vents are the only ventilation, there's no soffit vents or ridge vents)... My boyfriend insists that we need to remove all the soffits, install more ventilation... I figure if the house has been fine without it for more than 100 years, won't what's already there be sufficient? The attic ventilation is a huge bone of contention between us... lol... because I'm 'a girl' my opinions tend to get blown over, even if I'm the one doing most of the renos in the house myself..

We're not worried about being to code if we are warm... we cannot get house insurance anyway because the house is older than 80 years... so until we're doing final renovations, we are sticking with what keeps us warm and comfortable, not neccesarily what is to code.

 

[xpc]

"Can we roll out batts of fibreglass on top of the cellulose that is in the attics now?"

Yeppers, that's what I did. Just unroll and use a stick to push against the eves, Homedepot has $10 rolls on sale for R30 unfaced 15" x 25 feet, your main attic looks small at about 25'x10' and would only need 8 roll ($80). This will keep all your heat in the upstairs for sure. Also if you can you should do the knee walls up there too. Put the same R30 in the kitchen and when moved to the main it would total over R60.
http://www.homedepot.com/Building-M...splay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

"There are holes drilled in the outside walls for blown-in insulation in the walls that don't contain any, and none of the holes had been sealed up or covered over so I'm sure the rain did get in there... but there isn't any mold in the walls (that we have found anyway). The insulation was put in in 1982, if that makes any difference."

Cellulose has had mold, rodent, and fireproofing additives Incorporated for a long time, but if compressed too much will actually become a thermal bridge rather than an insulator. Since I was redoing all my inside walls I cut opening from within and filled with cellulose, it was much easier and warmer.

"and if so, do we need to increase ventilation (right now the end gable vents are the only ventilation, there's no soffit vents or ridge vents)... My boyfriend insists that we need to remove all the soffits, install more ventilation... I figure if the house has been fine without it for more than 100 years, won't what's already there be sufficient?"

I would not bother with soffit vents, you are right and how things were done and proved to work for hundred of years. Even my 60 year old house only has gable vents and decided not to put in any others. The extra heat built-up in summer may shorten the life of the shingles and is why when I re-roofed I went with a light colored shingle to help reflect the heat. I would recommend a metal roof when its time to replace, twice the cost but will never have to touch again for 4 generations (100 years).

"The attic ventilation is a huge bone of contention between us... lol... because I'm 'a girl' my opinions tend to get blown over, even if I'm the one doing most of the renos in the house myself."

I have been in a lot of attics over the last 30 years doing wiring and hvac installs, the last one was an 1870 two story and like all others of its time had no ventilation and the beams and lumber were in perfect condition, so leave the old part alone. If however when you build on the new kitchen it would be very easy to install soffit and ridge vents (no gable vent) do not mix venting as it disrupts natural convective flows.

"We're not worried about being to code if we are warm... we cannot get house insurance anyway because the house is older than 80 years... so until we're doing final renovations, we are sticking with what keeps us warm and comfortable, not necessarily what is to code."

I had to say that as a disclaimer, most people with wood heat do the same, as do I, just have a few extra monoxide detectors. Having at least 3 will make sure a failure will be covered, you can buy them as stand alone or as combos with smoke detectors but don't be chintzy with them.

Don't forget the crawl space foundation walls, the 1" R5.9 foam board will make a world of difference on cold floors. If cut in 2 foot strips it looks like 5 sheets ($100) would be enough for the main house. You should also consider buying more sheets and cut to the size of your window and line the edges with duct tape to friction fit in the openings, cut a small peep hole so you can easily look outside and to use as a pull hole to remove. I did this for two year until all my window were replaced with dual pane and insulated curtains.
http://www.homedepot.com/Building-M...splay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053

The replacement of an R1 to R2 window is not always worth it especially if you have outside storms, but the act of removing the old ones and insulating, foaming, and caulking all the cracks plus removing all the sash weights will make a much bigger difference.

 

[Mark-ln]

Does an electric water heater timer save money on the electric bill?