house heat loss

[kansascats]

We have this house --

basement is unfinished, and the above garage "bonus" room actually has the door from the house hallway (instead of the garage as shown). The door is kept closed and that above garage room is not routinely heated though it does have 2 AC baseboard heater units. The main level and upstairs are heated.

How long would one expect a house like this to go from 70F to 60F? We program the temp to be 70 during the day, drop to 69 at 10pm and then

60 at 10:30pm. At 7:30am it begins its climb to 69.

I'm just trying guage whether or not a 70 to 60 drop is good or bad from 10pm to 7:30am, or 9.5 hours. The overnight lows are typically around 15 to 25F. I'm just trying to get a handle on whether I should look for air leaks, insulate better, etc.

[Tony Hwang]

Hi, Do an energy audit. It costs but worthwhile. Or can you take IR photo?

[Ed Pawlowski]

It will get down to 60 at night but you should still check your insulation. Even though the basement is unfinished, you sill have heat loss. You can frame it and use fiberglass, you can use sheets of foam, or you can use

panels. Be sure the room over the garage has an insulated floor too.

You may want to review your temperature changes to be sure they coincide with your house use. We keep ours at 68 during the day when people are active, but 70 at 5 PM when the evening is more sedentary, then down to 62 at 10 PM. Weekdays, I get up at 5:30 so the heat comes on at 5:15.

[trader4]

w.insofast.companels. =A0 Be sure the room over the garage has an insulated

Dropping from 70 to 60 over 9.5 hours with outside temps 15-25F, sounds like a house that is pretty well insulated. Mine would certainly be at 60 before that.

I don;t see the point of the intermediate setting of 69 at 10pm, followed by 60 only a half hour later. You might as well just go to

60 at 10PM, unless the thermostat is the adaptive type. I keep mine at a max of 67 when the house is occupied, 60 at night.

[ransley]

A pro energy audit is worth while, I had a blower door test done they found leaks where I never imagined, A full audit would be best with Thermal photos and a breakdown of what you will save for what you can improve. Codes for insulation are old and not optimal

can get you looking in the right direction. Going from 70-60 means your heat is off you do pay a bit less but you just reheat it again, I dont believe in fully shutting it off and reheating it all again.

[Tony Hwang]

I recovered the cost of audit when I upgraded old furnace. Gov. rebate paid for the audit. Our 'stat is set at 21C when occupied, in the night and when no one is home(a dog and two cats alone during the day) it is set at 17C.

[ransley]

I recovered the cost of an audit from all the hidden air leaks and uninsulated areas I found and fixed, in a 110 yrs old home in about 1 year. You never can know how bad some things are without one.

[kansascats]

How do I locate a good energy audit vendor? I can only imagine there must be 100s of worthless vendors jumping into the fray. I would agree.. $250-$350 would probably be well spent. But I'm trying to figure out if that temp drop is an indicator of any sort -- be it good or bad. I just have no clue. It seems pretty good to me.. considering we have "too many" windows. They are all double pane Pella (the type you and snap out the interior panes).

FWIW.. I'm in NE Kansas. A good vendor in the Topeka, Lawrence, Manhattan, KC area would be w/i 1.5 hours.

This is interesting stuff.. maybe I should learn some on my own.. and consider it a biz op..