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For some reason Fred’s posts didn’t come up on the earlier post about Insulating an Old House by Steve Wink. I’m curious as heck what he wrote, because the conversation steers off toward paint peeling and smoke bombs. And that sounds fun to me!

Anyhow, a client’s house is a mini Victorian circa 1880’s. East Nashville, Tennessee. No complete foundation, just brick posts and brick wall around a couple of window bays. There’s about eighteen inches of crawl space. There’s also lattice covered plywood skirting with vents around the crawl space.

Does it make sense to vent this space? It seems to me that since the crawl space is so much cooler in sumer, when that hot humid southern air gets under it’ll immediately turn to condensation. Wet = Bad right?

The finished flooring is also the subfloor in this mini mansion — at least in the living room it is. The owner says it (the floor) gets very, very cold in the winter.

Having moved here from Western Montana recently, I had to chuckle when he said that most of the winter he can take it, but there’s about one week that it’s just unbearable…

How best to treat this space?

Before he bought the place (3 years ago) it had been gutted, new wire, pipe and pink stuff. White blow in fiberglass (I guess) attic blanket. Did I mention that the paint is peeling too?

Should I insulate the floor somehow?
Seal the crawl space?

Both?

Neither?

Up top there’s gable vents only. No soffit or ridge vents. Should these vents be closed off? He’s considering a home office up there. If I were to use DP cels upstairs and seal it up would the downstairs rot?

I’ll be studying up at Fred’s site whilst I’m waiting for replies,

Dan