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Our client has a basement that is partially underground. This wall has been showing signs of water infiltration. It is the wall that is located below their garage and subgrade. The homeowner uses their basement for storage and as a workshop so they want the space to stay dry and clean, and not have to worry about moisture causing any mold, mildew, or musty odors in the space.
Our team installed the Waterguard system, a track installed underneath the slab that along with the CleanSpace liner on the wall, diverts infiltrating water to the TripleSafe sump pump system with UltraSump Battery Backup. The system will keep water and moisture from entering the basement and with the battery backup, the homeowner can have peace of mind that even during storms, their home is protected.
This Williamsburg, VA homeowner has been a lot of heat exchange between their knee wall spaces and the rooms on the other side of the knee wall. This leaves them with rooms that they can't cool down in the summer and that is cold and drafty in the winter. The spaces are also home to ductwork which is impacted by the extreme temperatures making it even harder to heat and cool the living space.
We applied closed cell spray foam to the attic rafters and gable ends of the knee wall spaces. This will help with the heat radiating through the roof and heating the area up. This will protect the ductwork from extreme temperatures as well, leaving the homeowner with more comfortable rooms.
Poorly insulated knee wall spaces leave homeowners experiencing cold, drafty rooms in the winter and hot rooms they can never seem to cool down in the summer. Often, the only protection between a knee wall space and the living space is fiberglass insulation in the knee wall. However, it's ineffective because it's almost never closed in on all sides, provides no air sealing, and when knee wall spaces are home to ductwork, it doesn't help protect the ductwork from extreme temperatures.
In these cases, we insulate the attic rafters and gable ends of the knee wall space with closed-cell insulation. This helps to reduce the extreme conditions in the knee wall space that impact the living space making it uncomfortable by reducing the conditioned air loss from the living space to the unconditioned attic knee wall space and the heat transfer from the attic space into the living space.
With their old gutters deteriorating, clogged, and warped, this Williamsburg, VA homeowner needed to replace their old gutter system that had come with a leaf guard.
They chose to install the Gutter Shutter System which is guaranteed to never clog, sag, or pull away. Its extra-wide trough and downspouts carry 20% more water than traditional 5" gutters and will keep the homeowners off the roof and ladder, checking "clean gutters" off the chore list for good.
Mold and mildew have grown on many of the wooden materials in this crawl space, such as the floor joists. This occurs on organic materials when the relative humidity reaches over 60% during warmer temperatures. Musty odors and mold spores can rise into the home above and irritate those with allergies and asthma. We applied an antimicrobial, called Shockwave, to the affected areas, which will eliminate mold growth but does not remove any staining left behind from the growth.
One of the reasons the relative humidity has been elevated can be attributed to the fact that the crawl space floor is not covered by any type of liner or vapor barrier. This allows the earth's moisture to rise into the crawl space and affects not only the relative humidity but the environment. We installed our 10-mil CleanSpace Light vapor barrier over the dirt flooring of the crawl space, wrapped it around all piers, sealed it with vinyl tape, and mechanically fastened it to the foundation walls six to eight inches above outside grade. This will help protect the crawl space from any moisture rising from the ground.