A good read about air sealing your home

Does your house have a draft?  Can you see light around your door jam or does a particular room in your home always feel cold?  You could have an air sealing issue.  When cold air from outside is able to infiltrate into the home, its due to a combination of poor air sealing and/or insufficient insulation, and its one of the most easy ways to make your home more energy efficient and stay warmer.

It starts with detection and a visual inspection of the home.  Often first noticed by the homeowner, are little crevices next to a vent, or caulking that has cracked and warped away from a surface, maybe light showing in-between a door frame, or even a cold feeling when placing your hand near a spot on the wall.  Walk around the outside to find potential leaks and then inside in the same areas, check pipes, vents, and any other opening where two materials meet. 

Further detection can be done by a technician specialized in conducting a blower door test.  This test will depressurize the home, inviting in more air from the leaks for better detection.  There is no version of a DIY blower door test, this will need to be done by a qualified individual, but there are some methods that homeowners can use to detect where air is entering their home.  We will cover these in a bit.

 
The technician is going to determine how many air changes per hour are happening in your home at a specified pressure. An air change per hour, is how many times the entire volume of air in a home is replaced, per hour.  If all of the air in your home is being replaced, many times per day, you can imagine how much heat and energy is lost.  Air also contains moisture, much more than what is diffused into the home naturally. Air rushing into the home through cracks will bring mold growth, moisture damage, and let bugs and debris into your home via the openings. 

If this is not an option for you, maybe because its winter and you don't want to invite all of this cold air into your home with testing, you can use a few methods to detect where air may be entering.  The smoke from a stick of incense held steadily near walls, windows, and doorways will give visual clues if an air leak is present.  You can also dampen your hand and hold near the wall, window sills, vents, pipes, and anything else leading to the outside, to feel for cold air entering. 

OK, that was a lot, and now you know how to find air leaks, but how do we seal them?  Air sealing can be done with a variety of methods and combined together for maximum performance.  Your home insulation is a type of air sealing, as well as the walls and floors, because anything that prevents more air from entering the home is an air seal, and you can use as many methods as it takes.  This can be caulking around vents, new weatherstripping around door jams, sealing a hole with spray foam, and even some types of tape are used to air seal a room. All of these work to do the same thing, get in the way of cold air entering the home.

Spray foam is hands down, one of the best ways to air seal an existing room with cold spots.  For example, at my home, there was a spot under a window in my office that was radiating cold air, it was a solid wall with no visible cracks inside or outside, but something was letting in cold air.  Drilling just a few small holes that are easily patched, using a special vacuum attached to collect debris, and then injecting spray foam took the care of the entire problem.  My office is nice and warm again and the wall is thoroughly air sealed.
If you've never considered air sealing, do your own visual inspection!  Check the house frame and openings with a stick of incense, find out if its something your house will benefit from.  Chances are your home will thank you!

Give Akron Home Insulators a call today at 330-946-6720, or Visit Akron Home Insulators online. We look forward to saving you money!

Additionally - The US Government has doubled the yearly tax credit for energy efficient upgrades and air sealing your home is on the list!  Get up to 30% of project cost back, up to $1200 a year.  See this section for more information