Green Insulation

WKP Construction supports energy-efficient building and construction materials to help provide a safer and healthier environment for the future. I am often asked about what is a good green insulation option. I support these products:

Natural Fiber
Sheep Wool
Icynene Spray Foam

Natural Fiber Insulation is made from 85% post-industrial cotton fiber. The material used comes from taking scraps from the cutting room floors of blue jean factories, not from old previously worn pants, skirts or jackets. The scraps of cotton are pulled apart by machines that free up the individual fibers. Think of the pair of jeans you own that have frayed at the hem or cuff. This is the best analogy of what the cotton fibers resemble after passing through this machine. The cotton fibers are then saturated in a fireproofing solution, dried and mixed with polyolefin fibers. Once heated, the melting polyolefin fibers form the “glue” that holds the insulation together. The material is 100% recyclable, VOC-free, and formaldehyde-free. Never mind that it won’t itch like fiberglass insulation. The use of post industrial waste, naturally occurring fire and pest control and its very low toxicity make cotton insulation a choice worth considering for your next project.



Wool is a highly effective insulation roll with a superior thermal performance over almost all natural and man-made fibre insulation products. It is made of pure new wool fibres, which hold their shape and thickness throughout their lifetime. Being produced from 100% pure wool fibres, wool is a fully breathable material that will maintain it's thermal efficiency even in the harshest climates. The high density of wool fibres make it an excellent acoustic as well as thermal insulation. Wool fibres are completely safe to touch and work with, requiring no special handling or protective equipment. Wool insulation products environmental credentials make itthe "greenest" choice of any insulation product on the market. Sheep's wool is a naturally occurring fibre, so it is a renewable and sustainable source of raw material. Wool has zero global warming potential and is carbon neutral, so no environmental impact. Sheep Wool Insulation also requires only a fraction of the energy to produce in comparison to other insulation materials. At the end of its useful life, wool can be reused as insulation, recycled into other wool products or buried where it will eventually biodegrade.



Spray Foam Insulation is the product I most frequently use. The material is created on site by combining A and B component materials in a 1:1 ratio. 'A' component (isocyonate) and 'B' component (organic resin polyols) are brought to the work site separately and combined at precise temperature and pressure levels prior to application on your substrate. As soon as the A and B component come into contact with each other a chemical reaction occurs resulting in a liquid polyurethane that instantly expands 100 times its volume and cures within 4 hours. The expanding and adhesive qualities of Spray Foam fill every crack and empty space producing a true sealed thermal envelope.

The major advantage of spray foam is that in addition, to insulating, it restricts the free flow of air in wall and ceiling cavities. A 3 1/2" sample of foam has proven to be about 24 times less permeable to air infiltration than a similar thickness of fiberglass batt. In addition, the insulating power of spray foam is not diminished by lower temperatures or by air movement. Its R-value performs as stated. By contrast, some building experts state that an R-13 fiberglass batt in the presence of a 10 mile per hour breeze diminishes the insulating power of a batt to an R-5.



Feel free to email or call us to learn more about these products.

Building Transformation

Karns Law Group had a vision of converting this four-bay automobile repair shop into their new office. When I saw the plans for the project I knew it was going to be challenging. Adding a second story to the existing structure was the tricky part. When you build a new structure from the ground up, it is all tied together from the roof to the foundation. This is done with a style of framing called platform framing and uses various types of Simpson Strong Ties to connect rafters to walls, walls to sills, and sills to foundations.



In this situation, the new second story had to be engineered to tie into the existing building. Concerns about doing this are the lateral movements of the second story. One way to strengthen the structure and stabilize the exterior walls is to install lateral bracing. This is achieved by notching a 1"x8" board into the studs from the top plate in each wall corner diagonally down to the sill.



This pattern is repeated around the entire perimeter on the new second floor. Through the sill on the second floor we installed rods to the top plate of the new walls on the first floor. We built walls around the perimeter of the first floor and installed the same lateral bracing system. Here the diagonal brace met the sill on the slab. The sill had to be anchored with special anchor bolts and high strength epoxy. Now the old and new structure is connected and anchored.



Once this portion of the engineering was completed we began installing a new 1x12 floor system on the first floor. The idea was to elevate the floor off the existing slab to prevent possible water damage and allow room for insulation and a vapor barrier. After the main framing portion was completed we moved on to the exterior. The framing of the second story overhung the concrete walls of the first floor by 1.5 inches. This was intentional. Studs were vertically attached and anchored to the concrete walls at every stud location on the second floor. A heavy duty metal strap was installed from the top plate on the second floor all the way down the stud and connected to the 2x4's now attached to the concrete. This was additional engineering to tie the structure in as one unit.

Plywood sheathing was applied to the 2x4's on the first floor and now the old concrete building was hidden. The exterior was finished with cedar trim and clapboards (all hand nailed).

Here is the finished product...

Sawmills

I recently visited a sawmill in Freetown, MA. As I drove down the gravel road I began to get a whiff of one of my favorite scents... sawdust! As I arrived at the mill there were thousands of logs piled high and a barn housing all the equipment. I got out of my truck and walked around checking out all the equipment. It reminded me of Parlee Lumber in MA where my father would always take me to pick up lumber and wood chips.

Since I was a teenager, I have been fascinated by the history of sawmills and logging. I want to share with you a little history of how logs were first milled.

The Saw Pit was first used in the 4th century AD to mill logs into post, beams, and boards. It is simply a pit over which lumber is positioned to be sawed with a long two-handled saw by two men, one standing above the timber and the other below. In some cases, to avoid excavation, a retaining wall was built to rest the tree on while supports, called 'dogs', would take the remaining weight of the tree.



Shipbuilding was a major user of saw pits, often naval, where the planks of wood were sawn for the construction of all classes of vessels. The senior sawsman stood on top of the plank and the junior had to go into the pit, often partially filled with water. The origin of the terms 'top dog' and 'underdog' comes from this process.

The demise of the Saw Pit came around c.1250 when the hydro powered Sawmill was developed in the medieval period and spread widely in Europe in the 16th century. Sawmills had adapted the whipsaw to mechanical power, generally driven by a water wheel to speed up the process. The circular motion of the wheel was changed to back-and-forth motion of the saw blade by the pitman rod. A pitman is similar to a crankshaft, but in reverse (a crankshaft converts back-and-forth motion to circular motion).



In the United States, the sawmill was introduced soon after the colonisation of Virginia by recruiting skilled men from Hamburg. Later the metal parts were obtained from the Netherlands where the technology was far ahead. The arrival of a sawmill was a large and stimulative step in the growth of a frontier community. Early mills were taken to the forest, where a temporary shelter was built, and the logs were skidded to the nearby mill by horse or ox teams, often when there was some snow to provide lubrication. As mills grew larger, they were usually established in more permanent facilities on a river, and the logs were floated down to them by log drivers.



The introduction of steam power in the 19th century created many new possibilities for mills. They could be built away from water and could be far more mechanized. Small gasoline-powered sawmills run by local entrepreneurs served many communities in the early twentieth century, and specialty markets still today.

Here are some photos of an active small gasoline-powered sawmill...





The introduction of electricity and high technology furthered this process, and now most sawmills are massive and expensive facilities in which most aspects of the work is computerized. There is little waste in the facilities. Sawdust is used to make particle board, heat wood drying kilns, and pressed into wood pellets for pellet burning stoves. Larger pieces of wood waste are sent to paper mills and used to make oriented strand board paneling, a cheaper alternative to plywood.

So next time you see a truck load full of wood cruising down the highway, remember that hundreds of years ago it would have taken several men months to produce that much lumber. Today, over 15 million board feet of lumber are imported every year from Canada alone.

Victorian Renovation

In the Fall of 2008 a client approached me on transforming a property they recently purchased in the lovely 'point section' of Newport. The house was built circa 1890 and had never been updated. The exterior of the house was being consumed by overgrown landscaping and the interior layout was not practical for today's homeowner.

The new design called for extensive repairs on the exterior, new paint job, and blue stone patio surrounded by gardens.



The interior of the house had a lot of unused space. The kitchen was small and not conducive for my client who loves to cook. The dining room was behind the kitchen wall, the living room small, and the only bathroom was on the second floor.





Since the homeowners love to entertain, I wanted to tie-in the kitchen and dining room and give the first floor a bright open space feel. The old wall dividing these rooms were removed, the staircase pushed back to the north wall, and a half bath was added.



The floors are quarter sawn red oak with a dark walnut border. The staircase was custom made in our shop. Each tread was crafted to fit the winding pattern off a 6 inch poplar wood column (turned in our shop). The handrail and newel caps are dark walnut to match the floor.







Other features in the house include:
New electric and plumbing
New high efficiency direct vent gas boiler with on demand hot water heater
New HVAC - Unico System
Open cell .5 lb foam insulation