I’m doing some work for a friend who just put up a new home. He wants the basement to be finshed off for additional living space. Currently, it’s just raw concrete floors and walls. The first thing he want’s to accomplish is frame out the walls. Do I need to leave an air gap between the studs and the concrete wall? Do I use ridgid foam insulation anywhere? Poly anywhere? Thanks for the help.
upnorthframer
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I should also mention that he is planning on installing a dropped tile ceiling to cover ductwork/plumbing that is hanging from the ceiling. I did read a FHB article about finshing basements, which showed putting HDF on the floor and walls, then putting plywood over that for the floor and framed wall over it on the walls. Defenitly wouldn't do the floor that way, just wondering about the walls. Thanks
upnorthframer
the first thing is to check local building code they might spec something different, but yes you need to have a min. of 1" (frame to concrete) space otherwise all your framing material would need to be P.T. .
make sure your bottom plates are treated and if you can use borate treated it will save you from buying galvized or stainless steel nails
Bump
We typically stand 1" rigid (pink, blue, whatever available regionally) vertically and tape seams with exterior tape. The type of tape you would typically use for house wrap seams, etc. We then frame wall sections conventionally laid out built on the ground and stood up (easier with top plate towards block and drug and scooted into place). Walls are framed with treated btm plates and regular stock for studs. Walls are pushed snug to insulation, plumbed accordingly fastened at floor with powder actuated fastners and nailed up top. Check local code about draft stop or fire blocking below drop ceiling or any soffit/bulkhead areas as this is something we are constantly badgered with here in the Milwaukee area. No vapor barrier necessary as far as I know, I would not recommend any plastic sheeting anywhere on a basement wall, or fiberglass batt.
Before I start any work in the basement, I paint drylok or a masonry waterproofer on the concrete walls. I think it gives it another layer of protection from water. I then put up sheets of styrofoam (pink) whatever thickness you want and tyvek tape all the seams. Then it is down to the basics of framing the walls with pt plates and ww studs. I put in R-11 into all the walls with NO vapor barrier. All our walls are nice and warm and I have all the confidence in the world that we will never have problems with water or anything else.