Hey all,
I’m in the process of finishing off one room in my basement. The basement is not large and this room will be approx. 22’x12′ (about 1/3 of the basement footprint). Its just going to be a rec room but I’m going to finish it off nicely.
I am only doing this one room b/c there just isn’t room for more but this will be better than nothing. I know that the proper way to isulate is with polystyrene or EPS w/ either strapping or a regular 2×4 wall. I’m going with the 2×4 wall but I’m wondering if I can just forgo the insulation?
I would of course hold the 2x4s off concrete wall a bit but with in all I may have about 30′ linear feet of exteriour wall that will be part of this room which is maybe 20% of the basement total. Will I get any real value out of insulating? The basement is and always has been bone dry and I long as I’m carefull about concrete to wood contact I really don’t see gaining that much from this little bit of insulation. Is there something I don’t know. Am I thinking about this wrong? Any light shed on this would be much appreciated.
Replies
Others will answer your wall question, but I have a question for you - are you insulating the ceiling there?
I ask because the basement rec room is the perfect place for a rowdy group of friends to gather and play. If that's in the plan, then you might want to check out how well accousticly insulated you are. You don't want the downstairs noise broadcast throught the house throught the ventalation ducts for instance.
Rebuilding my home in Cypress, CA
Also a CRX fanatic!
Tu stultus es
You don't want the downstairs noise broadcast throught the house throught the ventalation ducts for instance.
Yeah, especially if they're gonna let the Gimp out of the box.http://www.quittintime.com/ View Image
Yeah, especially if they're gonna let the Gimp out of the box.
Is that what you kids are calling it these days.'Man who say it cannot be done should not interrupt man doing it' ~ Chinese proverb
View Image
Yes I have thought about insulating the ceiling for noise. I think I will as long as I'm going through the trouble of doing everything else.
Yes I have read the building sciences artilcles. Very good.
I don't trust the walls to be flat/plumb/true enough so even though space is a premium, I'm going with the stud wall. With the strapping, all it takes is one little spot and the whole wall could look like ####.
So what it seems the biggest concern is is warmth. I think as it is now it would probably find equilibrium in the low 60s and thats a little chilli. I guess I'm still unsure that it will matter though with the rest of the basement being uninsulated. Won't the heat just migrate out?
Speaking of insulation. I got pretty excitted the other day when I saw the ad in FHB for the RHH spray foam insulation kits. They look pretty cool and would have saved me a ton of time and work doing the ceiling in the basement and between the rafters in the attic crawl space. I was excited until I got the quote. Their system 50 (1" at 7.7R/1" covers 600sq/ft) and is $650.00!!!! I tried to get the sales guy to explain what the advantage was to this DIY kit when I could pay someone to do it for less. He didn't know. I was disappointed. I digress.
dry is one thing...and a nice one at that ,albeit.. but the question is warmth... is it warm enough down there to be comfortable??
All I ever wanted in life was an unfair advantage...
Being in Wisconsin, you have winters a tad on the cool side at times, so I would think you would want to insulate the concrete walls all around, to minimize heat loss, maximize comfort down there.
As to "bone dry," bear in mind that appearance of dry means only that any moisture diffusing through the porous concrete from the other side of the wall or up through the footer is evaporating as fast as it comes through, however slowly. If you put a wall surface over the concrete, so as to slow down the drying (or prevent it entirely), you could wind up with some mustiness in time.
You could tape a square yard of poly film over the wall, then wait a couple of days to see if there is any condensation under the surface. If you get any, then you need to cover the wall carefully.
http://www.buildingscience.com has some good info on insulating basement walls. I imagine you've seen that already, since you've referred to the use of foam and strapping. Is the concrete wall flat enough for foam/strapping, or is it so uneven that you are proposing a stud wall?
How much of your basement exterior walls are above grade?
How long do you plan to stay in your home?
I would recommend that you seriously consider insulating the entire space.
Jon Blakemore
RappahannockINC.com Fredericksburg, VA
Thanks for the reply.When you say "the whole space" do you mean the room or the whole basement.We plan on being here another 2-4 years. The walls are concrete block and about 18"-24" are above grade. I'm also replacing the old wooden awning type windows with some box store Vinyls. This isn't going to cost much (~$1000) and we really don't want to spend much. On the other hand I'm looking at probably less than $200 worth of insulation to do the walls up tight.
Edited 11/18/2008 7:50 pm by gcg
You're basically spending money to heat the exterior since you have a conditioned basement with no insulation.Without doing a more thorough analysis, it's difficult to know exactly how much money you would save per year to know how long it will take to pay off the insulating cost. But it is something worth considering.
Jon Blakemore RappahannockINC.com Fredericksburg, VA