Re: Finishing Basement Shop Questions

Apparently I'm not being clear enough. I don't want to frame out the walls. I don't want to lose floor space. I'd rather just fur out the wall with 2x4's laid flat against the existing wall, then use either plywood, drywall, paneling, or pegboard to cover. The question then becomes how to handle the situation with the existing insulation. This stuff wraps around the room horizontally with (2) 4' wide bats. So, do I

1. Leave it, and place the furring strip 2x4's over it? or
2. Cut it wherever there will be a furring strip, then re-staple or tape it to the furring strip? or
3. Rip it down toss it out, and re-insulate using 1.5" x 24" x 8' foam board between my furring strips. or
4. >I have been framing my basement over the past couple of months and have

Bill Lewis snipped-for-privacy@erols.com REMOVE both "nospam-" in return address to reply.

I choose #3 because the wall will be more secure, better insulated, straighter, firmer.

-- Is there no way that you can keep yourself from using this newsgroup as a place to vent on religion? Wrong place, wrong time.

Jim in NC

It depends on how much performance you want from your insulation. A 1.5 inch space isn't much thickness for fiberglass, particularly when it is over compressed. You also need to consider moisture. Will you need a moisture barrier at the concrete surface now that you are going to seal off the concrete with a drywall or whatever?

If you don't care much about insulation, try fastening a couple of 2x4s to the wall over the insulation and see if that gives you a secure enough base. It won't have much worse insulating properties than the already poor 1.5 inches of bats. You could slice the insulation adjacent to the studs and fluff it a bit to help fill the cavity. That would still be less work than taking it down, or pre cutting.

If you care about insulation, the foam is definitely the way to go.

Typical fiberglass bat material would give you an R value of about 4.5 in a 1.5 inch cavity if the bat were made for a

1.5 inch expanded polystyrene beadboard insulation would give you and R value of about 6. Real world tests show that foam board gives closer to rated results in typical installations.

For covering think about fire resistance. 5/8 drywall would give you good fire resistance and more strength than 1/2 drywall at a small increase in cost. 1/2 inch or thicker plywood wouldn't be bad. Regular panelling is neither durable nor fire resistant.

Rico

Whoops1 Wrong sig line. Sorry!

-- Jim in NC

I was wondering WTF you were talking about...