Insulate Attic Bonus Room

In the photo at left the kneewall is the short wall with the door in it.

Insulate attic bonus room.

The solar guard goes over the insulation on the attic side. Inappropriate mixture or application can result in suboptimal insulating results and hazardous fumes. Insulating the roof of a bonus room a homeowner faces a familiar problem. When finishing a room above is garage it s important to get the insulation details right.

Now if your bonus room has an attic your options are a little different. To meet all three goals insulating your finished attic ventilating the roof and maximizing headroom use a combination of dense batt insulation rigid foam sheeting and air chutes. Often attic bonus rooms such as my own are above unheated garage or storage space. Most codes require a specified minimum amount of headroom and it s tough to meet this requirement when insulating a finished attic especially since most.

Bonus rooms are often the least comfortable room in a house and the main reason is that they are the most flawed part of the building envelope especially the attic kneewalls. By utilizing spray foam directly to the underside of the floor sheathing cold floors can be minimized. Yes i know radiant barrier r value is controversial. You could opt for spray foam fiberglass or cellulose.

Turning an uninsulated space over the garage into a comfortable office. A bonus room isn t such a bonus when it lacks insulation. This helps keep the supply air coming into the room nice and warm. The problem with many kneewalls is that they have fiberglass batt insulation with nothing covering them on the attic side as shown in the photo below.

This allows at least half of the reflective insulation to do it s job since it requires a 1 or larger air gap on each side to be a radiant barrier and provide some r value. So after we seal up the insulated air barrier for the bonus room knee wall we install a thick blanket of cellulose insulation around the duct. The airflow in the ducts suffers from friction losses and the air loses heat to the cold attic space as it makes its way to the room. In any case be sure to provide adequate ventilation in any enclosed attic spaces.

Spray foam insulation creates an air seal that will keep you from losing treated air through the ceiling. This insulation should only be installed by trained professionals. By scott gibson december 2 2013.