I won't keep you in suspense here. The answer is yes, absolutely. Uninsulated ducts damage your siding in a humid climate in some cases. I recently visited a house in Atlanta that has that very problem. If you haven't scrolled…
I recently finished writing the chapter on the interaction of structure and control layers in my book. The last part was on the various ways to insulate the top of a house. The most common, of course, is to have…
I briefly worked at a dry cleaning shop in St. Louis a long time ago. It was December, and we had a bout of super cold weather one week. The temperature dropped to 0° F at night and got up…
Back in the summer of 2005, I got a call to figure out a moisture problem in a new house. The homeowners took me into the master suite, where the first thing to catch my eye was the towel folded…
The number one thing you need to do to protect a building is control water. As the Canadian building scientist Gus Handegord said, "The three biggest problems in buildings are water, water, and water." So, with the 1961 house I…
Ah, so many choices. If you want to design and install a duct system to create problems, the possibilities are endless. I've certainly written about a lot of them (as well as how to do it properly). Today, though, let's…
That photo above is from my basement. In case you missed my last article, I just bought a 1961 ranch-style house in Atlanta and am embarking on the wonderful building science adventure of turning it into a high-performance home. Ultimately,…
Let me tell you the story about a poor, young country boy who broke the law and launched me into my new project. Back in February, I was driving home from work one evening when a driver T-boned me. The…
I'm going to go out on a limb and make what you may think is an outrageous statement: Water is the most interesting substance in the world. Some of you may immediately respond, "Oh, yeah! What about beer?" (Or wine…
"Don't sweat the small stuff," they say. You know what, though? That may be great advice for your emotional life but it's terrible advice for just about anything to do with buildings. Whether you're designing them, specifying materials, putting them…