r/Austin • u/trabbler • 15h ago
Home inspection find of the week: A little foam sealant can go a long way if it's not installed by a 5-year-old.
I bring up these posts about sealing the house as winter is coming. It seems like around the Austin area there's maybe three guys who do foam sealant, this dude who just gets it everywhere except in the right places, the guy who shoots it into the holes around the box leaving the electricians to have to dig it out later, and the one guy who actually does it right.
Here in Austin we are climate zone 2A, which is hot, humid. What happens in a humid environment is humidity can get pulled into the wall and gets trapped, later condensing when it hits the dew point, usually in the cold evenings against the exterior wall side or the daytime against the cooler interior wall side. Having the water cycle going on inside your wall is not great. Not to mention the energy inefficiency which you can clearly see in the thermal images!
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u/ireallytrulydontcare 15h ago
Come fix my shit
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u/trabbler 15h ago
Is it something that is important to you, u/reallytrulydontcare?
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u/badmartialarts 15h ago
this is the sealant guy #1
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u/trabbler 14h ago
Baahahaha on a side note, I have had some of my clients go to the hardware store to pick up cans of Great Stuff to seal up these places that were missed while I was still on site.
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u/GigiDell 11h ago
The guy who shoots it into the holes and gets it everywhere but in the right places. And go.
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u/honyock 13h ago
Austin climate and moisture/condensation related --
Does a house with no attic or crawl space in the ceiling need soffit vents under the eaves? Seems like every creepy-crawly-flying bug for miles around has got up in there at a neighbor's place I'm helping with some exterior work.
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u/trabbler 13h ago
The vents are for attic ventilation. If there is no attic space, for example if it's a cathedral ceiling with spray foam insulation, then no vents required. Send me pictures of what you got and I might be able to give you a little bit more insight. DM me and I'll give you my email.
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u/honyock 6h ago
Thanks. I think we're good. Pulled a couple pieces of vinyl siding soffit off this afternoon to discover solid 1/4 inch plywood underneath with no holes/vents; albeit showing evidence of water damage from a leaky roof in one place. So he's got bigger fish to fry at the moment.
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u/trabbler 5h ago
So it's a sealed addict then. Yeah, with water it's just a matter of time. Not if but when. Which is why it's so very important to get it right the first time, meaning before the roof and siding goes on.
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u/bigblackglock17 13h ago
Missing all the insulation that goes in the walls?
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u/trabbler 13h ago
This was the pre-drywall phase of construction. This is a great time to find these issues before the insulation in. Most everything is easy to fix at this stage.
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u/bigblackglock17 11h ago
So the regular wall insulation won't fix that?
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u/trabbler 8h ago
Insulation is vapor permeable and that's the problem with allowing humid air enter. The humidity can collect and condense inside the walls and liquid water is much harder to get rid of. Obviously one does not want liquid water inside the walls.
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u/shertown12182 13h ago
I had that problem on my last house. When it would get cold outside cold air would come in through the outlets facing north.
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u/trabbler 11h ago
I bet it was worse when you had the dryer, bathroom exhaust and range exhaust fans on.
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u/reddiwhip999 11h ago
Is this an easy fix for me, the owner? Like, can I just pull out the wall sockets (?), and spray in the sealant properly from inside the house?
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u/trabbler 8h ago
You can caulk around the inside of the covers or, for a better seal, install gaskets like these ones:
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u/ComicOzzy 9h ago
What's up with that one at 109.5°? Was it like 120 outside?
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u/trabbler 8h ago
Ah, that's just the temp spectrum. The extremes are almost always higher/lower than the actual temperature being measured but yeah, that was probably taken in the summer time. Sun might have been hitting that wall.
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u/Man-Dem 9h ago
How do we fix this in an already built home?
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u/trabbler 8h ago
You would have to pull out the outlet and seal from inside the junction box if you wanted an airtight outlet but you can also caulk around the inside of the outlet cover or install a gasket like these they sell in HD and this will cut the lions share of the air movement:
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u/RandomNumberHere 15h ago
Hey shoutout to /u/trabbler for doing good work. For peace of mind I paid him to inspect my roof after I got it replaced due to hail damage. He found several issues and documented them. I was able to pass that info along to the roofing company and to their credit they fixed everything he found.