car-nut
Well-known member
I just bought a house with a 36 x 28 garage. It is not finished inside. needs to be insulated and sheetrocked. Any advise on the insulation. It is all 2x4 construction if that helps at all.
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insulation
- Thread starter car-nut
- Start date
rockwithjason
Well-known member
It's awful tough to beat fiber glass batts.
rockwithjason said:It's awful tough to beat fiber glass batts.
I agree. Just had 2 college kids finish mine (same size) in one afternoon. Just get a couple of hammer type staplers, a utility knife, and a tape measure and you're good to go.
RJRKCJ
Member
I see that you are in CT. That is an area where you might want to consider extending the studs out to 6" (5 1/2") to get a thicker fiberglass batts in the wall cavity. Overall the largest heat lost occurs in the ceiling area, if you think about it in makes sense as heat rises. The more on top of the ceiling the better. Closing up all the gaps between the windows and doors and the exterior siding should be the first step.
Vapor barriers should also be considered. Using college kids is a good idea just watch that they are neat. Gaps are not your friend.
When I lived in CT there was an energy service that would come out and survey you house an garage. Their analysis would show the best approach overall and factored type of heat, windows, current insulation, vapor barrier etc. They even used an infared device that showed that one of my exterior wall cavities had no insulation at all. There is also something called a blower door test but that might be an overkill for the garage.
In the end, it's your dollars that are going up and away and one idea from my insulator is that if cost is an issue go around to all the home centers and see if they will cut you a deal on the open bags that are around. They are often happy to get rid of them for suprisingly low cost and freguently the first batt is all that is damaged. Once they are in the walls only you know what you paid for them.
Vapor barriers should also be considered. Using college kids is a good idea just watch that they are neat. Gaps are not your friend.
When I lived in CT there was an energy service that would come out and survey you house an garage. Their analysis would show the best approach overall and factored type of heat, windows, current insulation, vapor barrier etc. They even used an infared device that showed that one of my exterior wall cavities had no insulation at all. There is also something called a blower door test but that might be an overkill for the garage.
In the end, it's your dollars that are going up and away and one idea from my insulator is that if cost is an issue go around to all the home centers and see if they will cut you a deal on the open bags that are around. They are often happy to get rid of them for suprisingly low cost and freguently the first batt is all that is damaged. Once they are in the walls only you know what you paid for them.
alankulwicki7
Active member
RJRKCJ said:you might want to consider extending the studs out to 6" (5 1/2") to get a thicker fiberglass batts in the wall cavity.
The more on top of the ceiling the better.
Closing up all the gaps between the windows and doors and the exterior siding should be the first step.
Vapor barriers should also be considered.
This is all excellent advice. It will cost less than $200 more for R-19 insulation than R-11. I was originally going to build my 24'X28' garage with 2x4 walls until I priced 2x6 walls. I think it was about $150 to upgrade to the 2x6 studs and R-19.
With your garage, you'll have to add on to the existing studs but it's not hard.
As far as insulating goes, a friend and I did my garage in just a few hours. I used full 8' studs instead of the 92 5/8" studs so I have to buy insulation in 40' rolls and cut it to length. If I had used the 92" studs, I could have used precut batts and cut the time in half.
It's not a hard job but it's well worth it in my opinion.