The beginning of winter has arrived in Swan Valley. Nevertheless, we continue to move forward with house construction. Below is about the third snow storm, this one brought about 6 inches of snow and drifts of 2 feet or more.
It seems appropriate that we are now pursuing insulating the house since we finally passed our rough electrical and plumbing inspections. A major victory for us. We established a contract with an insulation contractor where they would
supply R21 kraft faced fiberglass batts for the house and garage
ceiling that we would install. The,, the contractor will install all the R21
insulation batts in the walls of the house and garage, and install 6 mil
plastic vapor barrier on the ceilings in the house and garage as well.
Then we will come in again and install the 6 mil plastic vapor barrier
on the walls in house and garage. Once we figure out how to get the
drywall installed, then the insulation contractor will come back and
blow in an additional R30 or about another 17 inches of insulation in
the attic over the house and garage to give us about R51 in the
ceilings.
We started in the big room...there's Gari all suited up in her PPE and up on the ladder. You can see the snow out the window; it will be good to have the place insulated. And now that we are about finished with handling insulation batts ourselves, it is very good to get out of those respirators.
The kitchen and great-room ceilings are now insulated below. You can see the little electric space heater we are using to put a little warmth inside the house.
We used the scaffolding in the garage with the 12 foot ceilings. Gari surveys the few gaps remaining.
We boxed in a couple ducts that came into the living space out of necessity for drywall installation. You can just see the range hood duct and box at frame right up high.
Steve is busy cutting in the electric service panel below.
All finished...except for the service entrance cable. We will install that in the spring when we can pull the cable from the shop and switch the shop over to a 100 Amp service.
We contracted with a local Idaho Falls company to install a propane forced air furnace in the crawlspace with a 3 ton air conditioner. Below is a shot of the compressor going onto its' pad. We wanted a Trane system, but apparently because of supply chain issues with Trane it was a 6 month wait for a system and repair parts seemed uncertain. Therefore, we went with Japanese Diakin system. It seems very well built with good quality. We will see how it performs test by Idaho weather.
Below, Jacob the HVAC installer finishes up the AC system with a refrigerant charge, whilst the roofers repair a defect we found in the ridge cap.
Gari prepares the pressure test for the plumbing supply system below.
Steve installs the LED flood light over the garage door.
Just about finished..
Until next post, we will be working to get the inside of the house looking more complete like the outside.
