Blow in Insulation with a Leaf Blower
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- Опубликовано: 8 сен 2024
- Blow-in insulation is convenient, but what if you want to install just one or two bales of the stuff? In this video, I used a leaf blower to break up and expand some insulation for my attic.
I've learned that if I have a issue, someone else has had the same issue before me and has posted it on RUclips. The leaf blower idea worked perfectly. Thank you.
Nathan, I've been reading some of the negative comments here and they are just laughable. I've had my contractors license for decades doing everything from fine home building to renovations to multi million dollar industrial construction projects. For the small amount you needed to do, the leaf blower is perfectly fine. It saved you a few bucks, & shows ingenuity. Tom Silva from This Old House has a video where he just fluffs it out by hand, and he did a space much much larger. Some of these people here need to chill out.
Thanks. It is nice to get an "A-Okay" from a viewer.
I think some of the negative posts came from folks who missed the premise of the video, i.e. “What can you do if you want to install just one or two bales of blow-in insulation?” As you mentioned, you can break up the material by hand and drop it in place. If I did not have a leaf blower, that is probably what I would do.
I don’t mind critical comments from knowledgeable people, but if someone thinks using a leaf blower to break up one bale of insulation is wrong, they should suggest a better alternative... or even better, they should make a RUclips video showing how they think it should be done.
amen to that, thanks for sharing great idea!
@@duntyou8 Yep I remember when people used to fight Ideas with other Ideas instead of name calling and sensoring. Used to be the American way.
The internet is a full of “experts” and gaming chair doctorates posting “WELL ACTUALLY..” comments to make themselves feel superior. It’s ridiculous.
In general It’s like the sudo anonymity of social media has the tendency to bring out the absolute worst and most negative in people. 95% of what’s said on the internet to each other would never be said in a face to face scenerio. And that’s because well....this medium breeds cowardice.
You know they did some research on social trolling and found it actually satisfies a need in the amigdala, and like heroin, is addicting unfortunately.
I just did this same thing with a Worx leaf vacuum/blower, some large hose, and a pipe that I bolted to the plywood shed wall after cutting a 2.5" hole. The adapter was made from an automotive exhaust pipe reducer/adapter that I welded some washers to for bolting to the wall. It had enough power that it would bow the plywood out. It would destroy drywall. I blew 6 bags of blow-in fiberglass into the walls of my shed. I did have to shred the insulation and put it into a large container to be sucked up by the vacuum/blower. Worked awesome!
I did something similar but different. I had to replace the ceiling in my home. Rather than throwing away the existing insulation I used a leaf blower to recycle the existing insulation by blowing it into the other half of the attic. It worked really well.
Great idea, was about to donate my leaf blower and now I see use for it. Have a small area to cover, should work just fine. Thanks! People who give negative was thinking probably to see how they can do whole attic. It is for small areas and it is perfect. For big projects you will get free machine rental
Leaf blowers are also good for blowing out leafs from your gutters by hooking one end to the downspout and blowing up vertically. You can also walk on your roof on the 2nd floor and blow out leafs that way.
My dad took his electric leaf blower up into the attic. He took the old blown in insulation, and moved it over to fill in and fluff it up, then add the new insulation with leaf blower. I modified a water mister line on out put side, to help keep dust down. He didn't use the bag, he just blew it out as it went in, did really good.
I did construction insulation for a few years, I did mostly high rise glass window installation. On occasions when slow, I would get sent out to help attic and wall blowers. I was mostly hopper feeder, I'm way to big to get up in the attics.
The blower idea works great
Awesome! I needed to fill in small areas above can lights after putting in low-heat LEDs. I was trying to use a compressed bale by hand .... this method is perfect for my needs.
Great idea. Negative comments are from those that sit and do nothing.
I used the same leaf blower and it worked like a charm.
I like this! I plan on trying it with a twist. I want to put a hose on the end where you put had the leaf bag and try blowing it into the finished wall cavities of a shed. I’ll try to let you know if it works
Just saw this.....thank you for the info and what I appreciate the most is that all that dust isn’t flying around. For me, no dust is more important than the cost of renting a blower. I’m a retired guy and I’ve been researching the purchase of a low budget blower and I hope to make a little extra cash just blowing sheds, hunting blinds....etc.
Your fantastic idea will suffice for what I need here at home.
Thanks again and Happy Holidays.
Ps.....
Let’s go Brandon
It seems that rather than using the bag on the vaccuum, it may have been better to just break up the bale in the attic, then without the bag on the vaccuum, aim the outlet to where you want to throw the insulation. Seems the bag would simply re-compress the insulation to some extent.
great idea. good job
There is a fix to the clumsy walk-on-joists problem that will make installing more than a few inches of insulation much easier. You build an elevated platform to walk on. It's easily done with scrap lumber. Read on for instructions.
1. Take short 2x10 or 2x12 boards about a foot long. You can find them as scrap.
2. Nail strips of wood, perhaps plywood, on each side of those boards and extending down about 3 inches.
3. Slip the result over a joist, with two boards alongside one another on adjacent joists. Except on cathedral ceilings, they don't need to be nailed down.
4. Nail another 2x10 or 2x12 board a little over 24 inches long between the two boards. That creates a stable platform you can stand on rather than those elusive joists.
Make a series of those platforms and you can walk about an attic. And if you do this for a living, remove them after one job and move them to your next job site. The cost is almost nothing and you'll save a lot of time. You might also sell the result to your customers to make later work in their attic easier. All that walking on joists and kicking away insulation will wreck their attic insulation.
To make your work even easier, connect those platforms with longer 2x10 or 2x12 boards and you will have a solid path to walk about on. If you're blowing in insulation, the platform offers a 4+10+2+2=18 inch marker that you can, if you want, fill up to. Measuring is easy. Just fill up to your pathways.
That 18 inches will give a highly effective R-value of 65. Where I live (central Alabama) that means only on the coldest days do I need to run my heat. The rest of the time the lights and refrigerators keep the interior in the mid sixties. Combine that with attic foil for even more protection, particularly if you have hot summers.
Very clever idea that will help many of us. I have a 6 ft long enclosed floor cavity that I need to fill in with insulation from the end opening. I wonder if I could blow it in with my blower after I first crush it.
Good hustle
Genius
Cardboard box with a hole in it would have made a nice hopper
Just change bag for some tube and save your time :)
I wish they only wanted 10 bags for the blower... is 20 now.. and you need a trailer to haul 20 bags for sure.. full size extended bed truck only fit 15 and that was stacked as far as i wanted it strapped in.. and the damn blower isnt small either.
I got 34 bags of Green Fiber on a a harbor freight trailer towed by my Prius with the blowing machine inside the car. Trucks? We don't need no steenkin trucks. So nice to have that job done. It took 2 hours in the attic.
@@forwimp What kind of machine fit into a Prius?
Helpful, thanks !!!
Damn that was a long-ass video for that little bit of information
Where do you get those bails and how much are they?
You can get the bales at Home Depot, and probably many other hardware stores. The bales cost about $8 each.
+Owen LaBounty I just checked Lowe's and Home Depot. Same price to the penny both places: $12.43 / bale
Looks like you could have taken the bag there and break it up and slide it over to the cavity.
Rich, you are right. You can just break up the insulation by hand and drop it where you need it. That would work. But with the leaf blower, the insulation expands a lot more and gets more "fluffy". As mentioned by Fullflavor5, you don't really need the leaf bag either. Each situation will be a little bit different.
This is the Warnings given to Cellulose installers : Cellulose insulation is manufactured from shredded waste paper to manufacture loft insulation, installers are advised to completely protect themselves from coming into any kind of skin contact with the product or dust - to wear safety glasses with side shields, face mask or respirator, gloves, long tight sleeves, long pants and a hat kept in place with a hair net. Cellulose insulation is synthesized chiefly from recycled newspapers. The additional components it may include are binders, skin irritants, fire retardants, ammonium sulfate, sulfuric acid, borax, boric acid, and other chemicals. Cellulose insulation presents serious health hazards if inhaled, k/as dust asthma etc, and finally, it may also carry potential cancer causing agents or carcinogens associated with the original waste paper source and printers inks. Eventually the product does settle 40% under its own weight so extra material allowances for this must be made.
By hand would have sufficed good sir, but cool idea
I would have bought R30 roll and lay it on there, specially since you can get to it easy. It takes a lot of loose fill to equal an r30
Why is it called a blower if it sucks up stuff?
I guess you don't own a leaf blower, with the accessories. Many things are labeled as blow when all they do is suck.
@@jonpurgason4835 I like them both 👍😜
I bet a saltypecker does like it blown or sucked.. he nasty.. wash ya dik.. aint supposed to be salty if thats what theyre telling ya,. I dont think at least,. Never tasted pecker before but if i did id probably salt and pepper it first..
. Just open the package and throw it in.
smart man.
I thought you had to get it wet.
I want to caution all about the dangers of installing insulation incorrectly..Its fun to invent things( I know, I do it for a living) but insulation installed wrong can cause moisture build up and the nightmare just gets worse and worse until someone vacuums the material out, airseals the space and properly blows back in quality insulation making sure you have proper venting of the attic. Bill Jewell Insulation Technology Corp. Denver, Colorado
Trump won
@@jasonredepenning Trump won?? What did he win?? The booby prize? LOL
Why bother breaking the bale in a bin or a trash can when you can get it all over the garage floor instead? Good Lord.
The problem is this..... you say the way you used it yields 4 or 5 times the "bagged" volume. If you look at the specs carefully...and do the math.....using a "machine" (as recommended) yields 20-30 times the original bagged-volume, ... the proper expansion to get to the desired R value. Getting only 4 or 5 times the original volume means it's still too dense and not fluffed-up enough. Understood....this is a problem when only doing 1 or 2 bags worth.
Read all u want but even jesus needed 2 fish to feed the masses.. aint no way the hopper churns that stuff out 20 to 30 times its size.. it does maybe 10 if your lucky and you break up the bales real fine before tossing in the hopper.. but if you strung a bale of that 30 times its size the stuff would be dust... besides the stuff will settle over a short period of time anyways no matter how fluffy u make it off the bat.. but the hopper will still spit out some chunks every now and again,.. you can hear em coming up the tube....
would have been easier to just put in some batts
with that small space throw it around with your hand
I like dumb videos thanks bro
Your moms dumb., and i got a video you might like then. RUclips wont let me put it up tho..