Project : Installation of rigid styrofoam insulation in a Brossard basement
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This home in Brossard was constructed last year. The owner found that the basement was always cold and that his heating bills are really high. He also wants to eventually add rooms in the basement to expand his living space. So, with this project - we start of by the first stage ... insulating the basement to save money. Eventually, we will also add a ceiling and walls, but our friend wants to do it in stages. Here's what we did :)

bougieprojects@gmail.com

Step By Step : Each Photo Explained.

01 Materials
The basement was full of assorted boxes and supplies that had to be put in the center of the room, to allow us place to work and store our material. This should have been done before we arrived - but no problem :)

02 Preparation
In this photo, you can see the unprepared foundation of the home. Before we start installing the rigid styrofoam insulation - the foundation must be smooth and clean of all bumps etc ...

03 Imperfections
When the foundation was poured, the homebuilders did not remove the nail and cement form overflows. We had to chip away the cement and then grind the nails to give us a nice flat smooth surface to work with. This delayed the project but it had to be done.

04 Cut Outs
As we are adding the styrofoam, things like windows and protruding pipes got in our way. Many sheets had to be custom cut. We also added your some standard insulation in the back of the pipes to prevent them from touching the foundation. This helps to prevent them from freezing during an extremely cold winter. You can also use foam in a can, but I think that's too permanent.

05 Completed
The entire basement is now insulated with our rigid styrofoam insulation. In a moment, we'll start to add our vapor barrier. Even though we are using tong and grove sheets - you'll notice we also taped each sheet as an added bond.

06 Close Up
Here's another look from a different angle. Looks Good :)

07 Vapor Barrier
Now, we add the vapor barrier. Some say, that a vapor barrier is not required with rigid styrofoam insulation. But, we take no chances. I do not want to have to remove walls afterworlds because some code has now changed. The way I see it - the walls are open, let's do it anyhow.

08 Close Up
Here's another look at our vapor barrier. It's stapled and taped from the top. Afterwards, I'll add some epoxy and many more staples and tape to give it a nice smooth tight finish. Now it's ready for the next phase of our project :)

Below - Are a few web sites you might find interesting :)