Ponzini Comes Through

Last weekend, I sent Paul a plan with places marked that had problems with cracks and such as described in my post on insulation a week ago. I also sent him two zip files with photos, but, unfortunately, they were too big and didn't get through, and I didn't want to spend the whole evening last Sunday uploading them to Flickr.

Ponzini came by on Monday and fixed some of the problems, but not all of them. In particular, they finally sealed off the gap under the floor in the chase upstairs where the HRV is located. There were still a lot of cracks, though, and I did a walkthrough with Ponzini on Thurs. when Paul came by for the weekly meeting.

On Fri. they were out again, and this time they seem to have fixed most of the problems. They've mostly filled the cracks with pink foam. Here you can see how they fixed the small holes at the end of the beams in the ceiling, and the cracks between beams:

Paul says that the holes at the end of the beams and the gaps between two studs placed next to each other come from shrinkage in the studs and beams as they age. When they were originally placed, there was likely no gap.

Below, you can see how they've used pink foam to fill in a crack between two studs that were placed next to each other:

And here you can see  how they filled out the  foam along a header so it is level with the ceiling instead of only at the level of the wall:

This is important because the ceiling must be to R-30 whereas the walls are R-19. Heat leaks along headers are common if they are not properly insulated.

Finally, the cracks on  the big headers over the doors were also filled in:

You can even see where they used acrylic caulking compound in the places where the cracks are smaller than 1/4". The foam can only be put in if the cracks are larger than 1/4".

There is still one place Ponzini seems to have missed, in the new hot water heater closet upstairs, but, by and large, they seem to have done a thorough job of fixing the problem areas. It is somewhat puzzling, though, that they didn't just do these without my having to hassle them about it. Are most of their customers not as picky? Do they just not see these problems and need me to point them out? They are not, by any stretch  of the imagination, a "green" contractor, but they seem to know what to do when they are told where to do it. So I'm happy with the work they've done.