New York Renovator

Many old homes are loaded with toxic stuff, mine included. My area of New York State has one of the highest levels of homes with lead-based paint in the state. A lot of these homes were built in the 1800s, before people knew (and even after some manufacturers knew) about the dangers of toxic products for the home. Everyone hears about lead paint these days, and the dangers of it, but who hears about the dangers of asbestos? I hardly ever hear about it, and I know that a LOT of old homes have it. Mine does– it was used to wrap furnace ducts and hot water pipes, and is even on the exterior siding (lots of homes around here have asbestos-cement siding– a salesman made the rounds in the 60s and managed to wheedle a lot of homeowners to get it. :-p). Don’t fool with asbestos! It must be removed very carefully. You don’t want the fibers to become airborne, and you do not want to breathe them in.

Asbestos has been known to cause asbestosis and mesothelioma, a type of lung cancer. It was big news here in Central New York when a construction company had its workers remove tons of asbestos-laden materials without proper safety procedures and protection. It’s becoming all too common, so much so that there are now Mesothelioma Lawyers who specialize in this kind of action. (Ever see A Civil Action? Kind of like that). Mesothelioma is most common among people who work in the shipbuilding and construction industry, and in auto mechanics (brake pads are still lined with asbestos). The really maddening thing about this is that for DECADES industries have known about the dangers of asbestos and still some have done little or nothing to protect people. GRRRRRRR!!!

Asbestos is fireproof, which is why it became so popular. But when the material is broken into small fibers and allowed to become airborne, it can get into the lungs and “stick” to the inner lining, causing health problems. It is less of a threat to everyday homeowners, but you don’t want to be an idiot and spew the stuff all over the place! Read up on how to deal with asbestos and other toxins in your home before you start any demolition. In most cases, you can remove small quantities yourself with a strong plastic bag, a spray bottle to capture any loose fibers, and a HEPA mask. Know the dangers! And if you or someone you know has worked in the construction industry or shipbuilding industry, make them aware of the health effects, and get checked. And put the pressure on industries to stop poisoning our homes and communities!!

This is a sponsored post.

A while ago, I posted about the function of cold air return vents for a forced-air furnace. I have written quite a number of posts about this issue, actually– I became interested in this topic when I decided to re-do some of my old furnace ducting myself, last year. You can read about that here and here.

Well, I got a question from a guy named Barry who lives in Vermont (a climate just like New York State).

In my old Vermont house, with an oil furnace, I’ve got two vents clearly, forcefully, blowing cold air out into the house. Because of this, it seems impossible that they are cold air *return* vents. How can I confirm that they aren’t? Second question: can the furnace itself have the only cold air return vent?

I wanted to post his question and my answer in a separate post, because I think it may do others some good, searching for more information about cold air return vents. Here’s my response:

Hi Barry. Well, I’m not a furnace expert, but what I’d do if it was me is this:

1.) Make sure your ducting system is set up right. If you look at your furnace (you’ll see all sorts of ducts leading everywhere), you’ll see an “in” large duct and an “out” large duct, with many smaller ducts branching off of those. That’s for most forced-air furnaces, anyway. Check and make sure you know where the ducting system branches off into, and become familiar with your furnace system.

2.) My hot air return vents ALWAYS blow out cold air for the final three or four minutes right before the furnace stops. This is because the furnace fan keeps spinning for a little while after the gas heating flames go out– this is natural, to ensure that all the hot air has fully pushed through into the room. It’s the normal part of the cycle.

3.) Maybe your hot air vents blow out cold air because they are either too far from the furnace (like a third floor) or you don’t have enough cold air return vents and the furnace is just blowing whatever air it can find (and in an old home in a Vermont winter, that would be cold air).

I hope those tips help.

When I first paid attention to my furnace system, I was baffled that cold air blew out of my heater vents. After asking my Furnace Guy, he informed me about the natural cycle of a furnace air system. I suspect this may be Barry’s thought, too. Some furnaces will blow and blow cold air for quite a few minutes before shutting off and completing the cycle.

So I hope this helps anyone who is searching for furnace answers.

I am not a very “cold” person. Pre-New York blood as old as the native Indians runs in my New York veins, so I have a pedigree of cold tolerance.

BUT WOW it was freezing last night!

At 8am my thermometer read -5 degrees Fahrenheit this morning. NEGATIVE five. And that was when the sun had risen! BRRRRR. No wonder my sleep had been so fitful last night! Yow! How low did it get overnight?? I can’t seem to find the temperature recorded at my news sites. Oh well. It was cold!

I have to wonder how people used to cope with such frigid cold before central heating. Fireplaces and coal stoves don’t really give a lot of warmth. Were the people just more adapted to cold weather? Did they live and sleep with their fur coats on all the time? This house was built in 1855, before central heating. It’s a great, big drafty house with huge drafty windows. I know there were at least 2 coal fireplaces here (we find tons of coal chunks in the yard every spring). But that’s it?! What did people do? Sub-zero temperatures are not terribly unusual for Upstate New York in the winter. And even the semi-normal 10 degrees above zero is still a little chilly… so what did they do in the olden days to keep from freezing their tails off??

I know what I’m going to do– get a blanket and move closer to my computer!

About this time every year, my blog gets a lot of traffic from people searching for “can I cover my cold air return vents?”

Answer: no.

I want to address this issue again. If you have a forced air furnace, realize that there is an exchange of air going on with it– cold air to hot air. Your furnace needs to take in cold air, heat it up, and blow it out through your heater vents as heated air. If you cover your cold air return vents, you are starving your furnace, creating an air vacuum in your home (leading to an uncomfortable atmosphere), and perhaps filling your home with trace amounts of carbon monoxide.

Do not cover your cold air return vents.

I did a post about this when I renovated my living room, and re-did some of the furnace ducting to the room. I had done some studying and talked with my furnace guy. You can read the post here.

Now, my home has cold air return vents, but not enough. Not only do you need vents, you need a proper amount for proper air exchange. My house, at about 1680 square feet, only has two small cold air return vents– for the entire house! That is far too few. My Furnace Guy said that for every heater vent (and size) in a room, there should be a cold air return vent. Bedrooms almost never have them, and this explains why bedrooms are so cold in the winter– there is no full air exchange but rather a vacuum of air. The heated air really has nowhere to go, since there is no air flow; and the room air remains stagnant and chilly. So ideally, every room should have a cold air return vent (or at least larger ones in key areas of the home). I know, I know! Replacing and rebuilding your home’s ducting system is not as easy as replacing all the kitchen sinks! With ductwork, you have to rip out walls and work with metal. It’s NOT fun. However, the next time you have a wall open or if you decide to build an addition to your home, keep these things in mind. Your furnace will appreciate it, and it will show in the heating bills.

And in the meantime, keep those cold air return vents uncovered!

Photos courtesy of Americanhvacparts and Office of Energy Efficiency of Canada.

Now that winter is on its way out… well, sort of… I’m looking at heaters. This might sound funny, but just as the best time to look for tank tops is in September, the best time to look for heaters is after the rush. We have a behemoth, 200,000 BTU furnace in our basement, and it’s a direct vent, but I don’t think it is terribly efficient. For one, we do not have enough cold air return vents in the house. Installing them would mean breaking walls open on the first and second storeys, and building and inserting the ducting system. I’ve been thinking about doing it, but to be honest, I’m having second thoughts now.My attentions are going toward gas room heaters. Because they come in direct-vent models, they do not require the intensive ducting that a regular forced-air furnace does. One gas heater upstairs, one or two downstairs, and that’s it!

You know, when I really stop to think about furnace systems, I can get very frustrated. Most homes are still forced-air furnaces, which has been the most common system for the last 100+ years. I really think it’s time to reconsider the way we heat our homes. Forced-air is so inefficient and space-consuming that it’s ridiculous. It is almost IMPOSSIBLE to install all that ductwork in an existing home– and especially in an old, existing home. Gas heaters just seem so much more efficient, and since prices have gone down a lot, they are comparable to today’s forced-air furnace units. They also don’t suck the electricity to turn on (gas heaters require no electricity) and that means that if the power goes out, we will still have heat. I’ve had the power go out for days in the winter… and it wasn’t fun.

I’m looking around, checking my options. I’ve always wanted a gas room heater, especially a vent-free heater, and I am more open to them now that I’ve decided that I don’t want to rip out walls and make my walls thicker to install ducts. I’m really leaning that way. I’ll be posting about this development, so stay tuned if you are interested.

…but the fire is so delightful. Remember that old Christmas song? Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow! Problem is, I don’t have a fireplace!

Well, we finally got some snow out of this Nor’Easter, after a very shaky and sleety start. I was very disappointed to see the sleet, but we did eventually get 6 inches of snow! It was very cozy at home, for the most part– I made stew, baked bread, and baked an apple pie for dinner. I tried to keep the oven going because the house was freezing. With the storm came some very chilly winds, and the winds just seemed to slice through the house.

As much as I appreciate our new furnace, I just wish we had an alternative heat source. I’ve always liked woodstoves, but they are dangerous, messy, and take a lot of effort to feed and maintain. We had a wood-burning furnace when I was a kid, and it seemed that all we did all winter was stock that thing. (Not to mention all the chopping, cutting, and stacking of wood we did all summer and autumn).

I am determined to install a wall heater in the house sometime. The new vent free heaters are a breeze to install, and they keep the house toasty warm. I’ve been doing some research on them for several months. I think we will plan on getting two for the house: one for the downstairs Living Room area and another for the upstairs. This way, we can have zoned heating areas. I hate having to run the furnace for the entire house. We don’t use the upstairs during the day, so all that heat is wasted. I’ve got my eye on a very nice natural gas vent-free model that would be perfect for the Living Room/Kitchen area.

Also on my mind is we really should have another heat source should the power go out around here. This was a concern when I heard of the sleet storm this weekend; thank God power remained on.

I think the natural gas wall heaters are the most efficient, from what I have learned. They are clean, take up almost no space, very efficient with fuel consumption, and easy to care for. I have been pleasantly surprised at how the prices have dropped for these models!

When we get one, I’ll be sure to offer our usual play-by-play description of the process, and offer a few tips as well. Stay tuned!

I’ve watched, from a distance of course, the rise of popularity for radiant floor heating. It’s a terrific invention, I think. I have lived all my life with central heating, and I’ve come to have some strong opinions about it!

Most of the homes I’ve lived in had forced air heating systems. I dislike them greatly. They create drafts and the house never seems warm. There is a ton of dust. And if you have an odor in one end of the house, within one minute of that furnace kicking on, it’s permeated the house. I dislike forced-air systems very much.

I’ve lived in a few places with radiator heating. All places were very old apartments with very old radiators. I didn’t care for the radiator system, either. If you were within five or six feet of the radiator, you’d be warm. But radiators didn’t radiate very much.

I’ve lived in a house with a wood furnace (far to much work) and electric baseboard heating (far too expensive and noisy).

I’ve watched with interest the introduction of radiant heating to this country. Radiant heating is not “new.” It’s been established in Europe for a long time.

In the 70′s here in this country, radiant heating was added to ranch houses with concrete slab foundations. It was not very well thought through when it was introduced in modern homes. Radiant tubing of copper pipes was placed in the subfloor, and a fresh coat of concrete poured over it all. Hot water from a boiler flowed through the pipes and warmed the floors. It was a lovely idea. But you cam’t stop physics. The exchange of hot and cool temperatures causwed the pipes to shift a little. Concrete doesn’t like shifting. Pipe seals broke, leaked into cracked concrete, and before you know it, it’s a disaster. Not only have you lost your heating system, but you’ve lost your floor.

So I’ve watched and waited. I’ve seen the introduction of PEX tubing to the idea. I like PEX tubing, but I have my doubts if it would really work here in Upstate New York. It gets cold, bone cold here for long periods of time. And I’m not too keen on anything being “set in stone” or, in this case, concrete.

But radiant heating is extremely appealing. Heating with water has got to be the best means of heating anything, and water is doubly efficient because the same water you use to heat your rooms can be the same water you use to wash your dishes or take your bath. Radiant heating heats the floors, which in turn heats objects. No drafts, no exchange of one kind of air for another. You can also install hardwood flooring– usually a chilly option for homes in the North– and still stay warm. As a matter of fact, hardwood floors are recommended with radiant heating, because the wood doesn’t insulate the heat from the room, as a carpet would. It’s very appealing indeed.

You can even install radiant heating with PEX and aluminum flashing to existing homes. Although, I wouldn’t in my house. Older homes have a plethora of problems and situations unique to newer homes. The way my sill sits on my foundation, for example, and how my home’s framework is built (balloon frame). There are a lot of drafts within the foundation and between the sill-plate and wall-framing that I cannot access. The wood is old, it has shrunk, my basement is very drafty. I also have a century’s worth of pipes, drains, and wires protruding every-which-way. I couldn’t even begin to imagine where I’ve have the space to install radiant heating to the floor. Unless I ripped everything out to the house’s barebones and started from scratch. But then again, why do that? Just build new. So I really think that to install radiant heating right, you’d have to build new, with proper preparation and installation.

It’s an interesting system and one I intend to monitor for a little while longer. If I ever build a new house, I think I would choose radiant heating above all else. So far, I think it’s the best system out there. But even that makes me sad. That’s the best we have? We’ve been to the moon, sent a robot to Mars, and we still have a heating system that’s only one step advanced from the stone age?

This blog gets a lot of hits from people searching Google, questioning whether they should cover their cold air return vents.

I just wanted to let you know that it is very unadvisable that you cover these vents. I did for a few years until my Furnace Guy informed me of the details.

Your home needs cold air return vents. The hot air coming from your furnace entering your house must have a source. Unless you have a very sophisticated direct-vent furnace with supply air coming from the outdoors, you need return vents. This keeps the air in your house moving and reduces air pressure from the heater vent air filling your room.

Think of it as a fan in the summer. If you put your fan in your window and open the door, what do you have? Circulating air. What happens if you close all other windows and doors in that room and still run the fan? The fan blades still work, but the circulating air supply is almost entirely choked off, and the cool air no longer vents. It eliminates the fan’s efficiency. Moreover, it makes the fan run and you are still charged for the electricity to run the fan. You are essentially paying for nothing, plus wearing out the fan motor even faster.

A forced-air furnace needs intake air to supply the outtake air. To close off your cold air return vents chokes off the intake air supply. So it not only is costing you more money to do less, it is also making your furnace work harder to run.

My Furnace Guy said that, in a perfect world, every room that has a heater vent should have a cold air return vent. There is a mathematical calculation they use to determine how many return and supply vents a room and house needs. In my old home, I only have TWO small return vents. This is not good. I am trying to fix this, knowing that it is costing me more and making my new furnace wear out sooner. The worst thing I could do is cover my cold air return vents.

So… if you are wondering whether or not you can cover the cold air return vents– no, you can’t.

Did you know that the phrase “by the skin of my teeth” comes from the Bible book of Job?

Just an interesting fact.

I’ve slowed down my renovations to a mere crawl these days. We are just too busy with school and fall/winter preparations right now. It has been…uh, interesting, using the fixtures on electrical system I installed. Nothing goes wrong, it is just me. I still remain jumpy when a light bulb goes out (oh no! did I wire it wrong?) or an appliance malfunctions (oh no! will it explode into a fireball?), but everything is really working as it should (no sparks, no flames, etc). So far.

Uncannily, we had a power surge during a horrific thunderstorm a few weeks ago. PEOPLE, BUY A SURGE PROTECTOR FOR YOUR COMPUTERS! During the storm, we heard this eerie, cackling zap throughout the house. Right after that, my daughter called me to the computers (which were on during the storm) as they mysteriously rebooted themselves and started spewing screwy BIOS information. Gulp. I shut off the power to the computers, restarted them, and, thank God, they seem to have recovered. I shudder to think of what might have happened had I no surge protectors. The rest of the electrical system here seemed OK (except for the digital timer on my coffeepot, which flashed Chinese numerals until I reset it). But it was a fright, to be sure. I also wonder if part of the problem was that the computers had not been plugged in to a grounded outlet area (the part of the house with the very old wiring). The next day we moved the computers to the part of the house that I had redone with proper, grounded wiring.

Other good news is that we finally got the thermostat for the furnace installed! On October 22nd (Monday)! Believe me, waiting that long to finalize the heating system in Upstate NY is risky. But the weather has been incredibly balmy in Upstate all month. No frost yet! Our frost date is usually about September 25th or so. I expect the weather to change at any time, however.

The problem with the thermostat was that… well, let me go back a little. Earlier in the summer I had removed it along with everything else when I gutted the Living Room. The thermostat wire had been plastered into the wall at some point when that part of the wall had been patched long ago. Needless to say I had to pry the very old and decrepit wire out of ancient, hardened joint compound, and the thermostat wasn’t too happy to move, either.

Unfortunately, I didn’t take a close look at how the thermostat was installed before I removed it. Oops.

So months flew by as we demolished, hacked, electrified, insulated, hammered, nailed, painted the room etc. Now I will say that I did have enough foresight in getting the proper wiring, placing it inside the wall, etc. Everything was set to install the thermostat until when it actually came time to do so. I just couldn’t figure out where to put the wires and where to place the screws. I didn’t remember how it looked when I had removed the thermostat….

I searched the internet for instructions and the most detailed I could find said, “For wiring instructions, see your installer.” Sigh. I have a great Furnace Guy, but this is peak season for him and not only was he hard to reach (I’d tried calling him a dozen times for advice but he was crazily busy) but I didn’t want to pay for a service call. My husband decided to tackle the thing. He studied the thermostat for a while and tried screwing in a few wires. I, in the basement, flipped the switch to see how it would go. Nothing. My husband tried moving some wires around, try that. Nothing. We were baffled. I was going to have to petition my Furnace Guy. Winter was coming and this fluky warm weather wouldn’t wait for us.

After two weeks of phone tag, my FG popped by. He took a long look at the thermostat and my husband’s wiring job. He scratched his head and asked, “And it doesn’t work?” He wondered if something was wrong with our furnace– that $4,000 furnace we got last year– brand new– after the flood–and whose warranty had just expired a week ago– that furnace. Gulp.

We double-checked everything: the circuit breaker (even though I had never removed the furnace circuit when I’d done the panel work), the wires, the junction boxes, the connections… time was ebbing away and my FG had to go soon. He tested the furnace’s electrical panel (with some very cool voltmeters!) when he suddenly said “aha!” He pulled out this tiny purple thing from the panel and tested it. It was the fuse to the furnace. Remember that power surge we’d had? It had blown out the fuse to the furnace. My FG said fuses are a great safety feature, because that tiny fuse absorbs excess electricity should any flow. If anything were to get by that fuse and zap the electrical panel, it would cost hundreds of dollars to replace. So that tiny little purple thing saved my new furnace. Neat.

The FG had an extra fuse on hand, he plugged it in the little slot, and voila! The furnace kicked in and started running! Not only was I thrilled that the thermostat finally worked, I was thrilled that my wiring work over the summer and my husband’s installation of the thermostat worked! Wow was I happy!

To put the icing on the cake, my FG said there was no charge for the service, not even for the cost of the fuse. What a guy! I paid him with a big bag of garden tomatoes and that seemed to make him happier than if I’d written a check.

Well, now we are really ready for winter. And given the weather forecast for the week, we did by the skin of our teeth.

AT LAST! I have my furnace ducting finished. It has been a long job– took weeks– but it is complete. It took so long to complete this because the ducts are so integrated with the room (walls and floor). I now have three heat vents and one cold air return. I should actually have another cold air return, but I am going to wait on it until I remodel the accompanying room (when we finally remove the crumbling chimney).

I can’t even begin to explain how I did this job, it was so time-consuming and complicated. Cutting the metal with tin snips was the hardest part, I think. Also difficult was screwing in the sheet metal screws.

I do not consider my ductwork to be final. This is something I would truly like a professional to do. Working with metal, and that room by room, is enormously laborious. I had to do this room myself because the cost isn’t in the budget right now. I think I did a good enough job to last us a few years. By then I’ll probably hire my furnace guy to redo everything. Ductwork is pretty intense work. I have great respect for my furnace repairman.

I did not recycle as much of the old ducting as I wanted. This is mainly because the old ducting is 7-inch diameter. Modern measurements are 6- or 8-inch. I was in a real pickle, trying to make things match. I used a few adapters (6- to 7-inch) and I stuck with the flexible ducting. I suppose I could have bought all new 6-inch ductwork, but it would have cost a small fortune for this room.

Anyway, I think my adaptations are acceptable. I can rest easy that we are ready for winter now. The ducting is sealed good and tight. It is free from drafts and finally free from all those spiders making their nests in the holes.