The house finally looks like a house again on the inside. When I walked through earlier this month the walls had insulation in them, new windows were in, and the new back porch was up. It’s been almost a year since the last journal entry, when the permit was issued and the crew had just dug the first footings in the basement.
Insulation
The exterior walls are now filled with closed cell spray foam insulation, which also seals the air gaps and creates a tight building envelope needed to make an all-electric house work. Heat pumps don’t work as hard when the heated or cooled air stays inside.
Some interior walls got fiberglass batts as an inexpensive way to modestly improve noise isolation.
The basement unit
The basement is now framed out for the third unit. Before the framing went up, the crew covered the foundation walls with a dimpled drainage membrane (the black sheets). The dimples create a small air gap so any moisture that comes through the brick runs down to the drain tile under the floor instead of soaking into the drywall.
Back porch
The new wood back porch is built and the stairs are in. The crew was still working around its base, and the yard is a mess of gravel, lumber, and wheelbarrows.
Drywall is coming next, but before that I hired an inspector to perform a “whole house” blower door test to find areas where the spray foam was insufficiently applied. Once the drywall, windows, and final doors are installed then the same inspector will return and do a blower door test in each dwelling unit. The ComEd Electric Homes program requires that the house passes all three tests.
