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Any advice on how to cut heating bill without fugly-fying your house?
I would lower the thermostat to 65 and then have space heaters in areas that you are in such as a bedroom at night or living room in the daytime. they also sell heat and cool window air conditioners.
maybe if you live in some armpit like Seattle, but I"ve done this many times, in OK, ILL, and CO, no problems with mold. Like I said, if you care more about looks than about wasting 1-2k $ per year, why are you bothering to read this topic-thread? I'm not talking about being too lazy to take down the plastic once spring comes, you know.
I would lower the thermostat to 65 and then have space heaters in areas that you are in such as a bedroom at night or living room in the daytime. they also sell heat and cool window air conditioners.
That would end up costing us more money in the long run, since the electric is more expensive than the gas floor furnace!
Quote:
Originally Posted by dreadd
maybe if you live in some armpit like Seattle, but I"ve done this many times, in OK, ILL, and CO, no problems with mold. Like I said, if you care more about looks than about wasting 1-2k $ per year, why are you bothering to read this topic-thread? I'm not talking about being too lazy to take down the plastic once spring comes, you know.
Eh, I disagree. We live in a tiny lil 40's house (rental), with substandard drywall (learned that when my butt went through the wall one day! Don't ask, lol!) and NO insulation between the drywall and outside! Basically, it's the drywall, then the sheathing board, then the siding, and that's it. So we close off rooms we aren't using during the day, when we bake, after turning the oven off, leave it open to heat the kitchen, and wear more clothes. Sure; for the first 25-30 mins after getting home, the bedrooms are COLD, but not as cold as outside, lol!
If this were our home, we would of course insulate the exterior walls, and rehang better, thicker drywall; as well as refit the exterior door, as well as insulate the attic, and dryfit the crawl space, etc.... to save cool and heat, but it's not feasible, nor is it our problem to.
That would end up costing us more money in the long run, since the electric is more expensive than the gas floor furnace!
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Not true, you can get a space heater that costs $20 to $50 to run a month instead of paying $200 extra that month to keep the whole house warm. The oil filled radiators are a good choice to keep an area warm without using a lot of electricity. You can lower your heating bill a lot by lowering your thermostat t0 65 or less.
maybe if you live in some armpit like Seattle, but I"ve done this many times, in OK, ILL, and CO, no problems with mold. Like I said, if you care more about looks than about wasting 1-2k $ per year, why are you bothering to read this topic-thread? I'm not talking about being too lazy to take down the plastic once spring comes, you know.
The point is if saving money is more important than looks, foam insulates much better than plastic and will save more money over the long run. But if you care about the long run you're better off investing in good insulation from the get-go rather than rigging up some plastic kit you put up and take down each year.
Practically speaking, if you're living in a small plastic bubble for 6 months of the year to, uh, "save money", why are you spending money on a house with an un-insulated basement and attic that only get seasonal use? Why not just move into a house that is smaller and better suits your lifestyle? Unless you're getting some kind of thrill from living in a plastic cave. Frankly that seems to be the case if you've moved several times across states and kept up this ritual.
Building technology has improved quite a bit recently with regard to energy efficiency. Insulation is fairly inexpensive, especially when it comes to retrofitting an old, un-insulated house - you get big gains from even minor improvements. It's fairly easy DIY work if you're not too lazy to do the research and get your hands dirty.
get some sheet plastic, thumbtacks and blue masking tape. suspend the plastic over each window (all the way out to the wall) with the tacks, then seal it all around with the tape. Do the same with all but your main use door. In front of your main use door, use Duct tape to create a "z" of 3 plastic "doors", tape running down one side of the plastic. Have the tape seam be on the left side for 2 sheets, on the right side for the middle sheets. So when you want to use the door, you have to "wend" your way thru 3 plastic "doors".
The effect of all this is that you lose much less heat to the outside. Also seal off the steps or or access to the garage, porch, attic and the basement. You WILL have to have a small vent-hole at one window, opened for a bit every day, and "wave" the main door around for a few minutes, to refresh the oxygen in your home's air. Dont burn candles or incense or have any sort of combustion heater with this set up, or you'll have to do additional venting. Naturally, you need a CO detector, regardless of how your home is set up.
Gee, this is nothing new, we have been doing this to our single pane aluminum windows for decades. which we hope to eventually change out.
We tape them up about November 20, just before TG, and take down slowly about March 15th when the weather starts to get warm and we want FRESH AIR flowing through the house.
Some windows never get uncovered, except for the odd change of the tape/plastic.
Plastic comes heavy and clear, or light and clear, or the dreaded heavy and cloudy. We search for the heavy and clear, and find it at craft/fabric stores if the home centers don't have it.
Probalby saves us half our energy bill, no joke!
Now, woth Gorilla TAPe, we can tape upthe outside too, to the aluminum siding. Then we get dual coverage! and if it comes off , so what? at least it provided savings while it was there.
Just be sure to air out your house and have your CO2 monitor handy.
Thanks for the tips though!
That would end up costing us more money in the long run, since the electric is more expensive than the gas floor furnace!
Eh, I disagree. We live in a tiny lil 40's house (rental), with substandard drywall (learned that when my butt went through the wall one day! Don't ask, lol!) and NO insulation between the drywall and outside! Basically, it's the drywall, then the sheathing board, then the siding, and that's it. So we close off rooms we aren't using during the day, when we bake, after turning the oven off, leave it open to heat the kitchen, and wear more clothes. Sure; for the first 25-30 mins after getting home, the bedrooms are COLD, but not as cold as outside, lol!
If this were our home, we would of course insulate the exterior walls, and rehang better, thicker drywall; as well as refit the exterior door, as well as insulate the attic, and dryfit the crawl space, etc.... to save cool and heat, but it's not feasible, nor is it our problem to.
My house is as drafty as all hell. I know there's no insulation in the kitchen walls, because when I open the cabinets, I can feel the cold. My plates are so cold, I warm them in the microwave before I eat.
You could save a lot more money on your heating by simply moving to Florida.
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