Hi – I’ve taken your advice and we have insulation being blown into our walls and attic next week. I was hoping also to get an attic fan (not a whole house fan) installed before then. I was wondering what size fan I ought to get? The attic is about 675 sqft. How far from the vent window should I place it?
The AC guy thought that if we got insulation, then our AC should be powerful enough to keep working fine for a few more years, so thanks all for your advice about which to get done first – insulation, new AC or attic fan.
mj
Replies
Hi,
You might want to do a bit of research on whether to install an attic ventilation fan. Some places (e.g. http://www.SouthFace.org) are recommending against them. I don't remember all the objections, but it seemed to center around the attic fan slightly depresurizing the attic, which tends to draw air up from the conditioned space via an cracks or openings that exist. They are recommending that people just go with good passive attic venting.
If you have not done it already, you might want to get up in the attic and seal up all the wiring, plumbing and other pentrations between the living space and the attic -- easier to do before the insulation goes in. I found many many places to seal on my relatively new house. Also, if you have ducts that run through the attic, its a good time to seal up joints with duct mastic and insulate the ducts.
Some good writups here:
http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Conservation/conservation.htm#Insulating
Gary