Insulate Attic And Finsh With Vents

In an unfinished attic the goal of insulation is to keep the rooms below cool in summer and warm in winter.

Insulate attic and finsh with vents.

With a finished attic insulation must help keep the attic areas comfortable. The airflow from the soffits to the ridge vent keeps the roof cool and prevents ice dams and the material will block that flow. The air is then exhausted through gable or attic vents above the soffits. Since parts of a finished attic are usually very close to the roof insulation often blocks proper ventilation that is needed under a roof structure.

For this to be fully effective low vents should be installed to replace the air that is escaping. Ventilation the best method for ventilating any roof is to have some type of venting up high on the roof that allows for rising hot air or warm damp air to escape. Most codes require a specified minimum amount of headroom and it s tough to meet this requirement when insulating a finished attic especially since most codes require insulation equal to r 38 or more. Of vent for every 300 sq.

That said air resistance and interference such as vent grates reduces the area of true ventilation. Soffit vents sit underneath the eaves of the roof of a house to allow air circulation into the attic. Covering up the soffit vents with loose fill or batts which can happen if you stuff insulation along the eaves is a huge no no. Building codes vary.

The attic floor which is the ceiling of the living space below often already is insulated. To meet all three goals insulating your finished attic ventilating the roof and maximizing headroom use a combination of dense batt insulation rigid foam sheeting and air chutes. Generally speaking you need a ratio of 1 300 where for every 300 square feet of ceiling space you need 1 square foot of attic ventilation. In other words the entire vent opening doesn t count as vented space.

If it is and you plan to provide heating and cooling to the finished attic space you need to remove. I reshingle this past year and pulled out old r14 insulation and retaped as many as visually possible areas of vapour barrier leaks cuts in material etc. With the mb insulation program i blew in insulation to fill the cavity and added two duraflo vents to the roof area 52 14 with now 4 and a wind turbine. That means insulating the attic floor only not the walls and having vents in the roof.