Hosts: Tom Kraeutler & Leslie Segrete
(NOTE: Timestamps below correspond to the running time of the downloadable audio file of this show. Text represents a professional transcriptionist’s understanding of what was said. No guarantee of accuracy is expressed or implied. ‘Ph’ in parentheses indicates the phonetic or best guess of the actual spoken word.)
BEGIN HOUR 2 TEXT:
(promo/theme song)
TOM: Coast to coast and floorboards to shingles. This is The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: Call us right now at 1-888-MONEY-PIT with your home improvement question, your do-it-yourself dilemma. Before you pick up the hammer, pick up the phone and call us. We will help you get the job done.
And today we are broadcasting a very special edition of The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. We are at the International Builders Show in Orlando, Florida; a Mecca for construction professionals. This is sort of an inside industry event not open to the public, so we’re here to spill the beans on the latest and greatest in home technology.
LESLIE: (chuckling) Which I’m perfect for because you know I can’t keep a secret. (laughs)
TOM: (overlapping voices) Can’t keep a secret. That’s right. (laughs)
LESLIE: That’s right, we’re bringing you the best of the best from the show village. We are onsite at the high-tech home and this is all courtesy of our friends at Owens Corning.
TOM: We’re actually broadcasting from the front porch here at the high-tech home.
LESLIE: We’re not in rocking chairs, though.
TOM: So it’s got that old sort of hometown feel to it, but this home is actually far from home. It includes the best and most cutting-edge technology the building industry has to offer.
LESLIE: That’s right. In addition to the high-tech home there’s two others. The show village includes a green home and a comfortably affordable home, which are two words that I like a lot, and Mike Draper is a professional builder with 30 years of experience in the factory-built housing industry.
Welcome, Mike, how are you today?
MIKE: I’m great, thank you.
TOM: Now you have been involved in both of these projects. Let’s talk first about the green home. Big trend right now. Getting a lot of demand?
MIKE: It is a very big trend. We’re getting a lot of people that are requesting green homes; a lot of builders coming in that are requesting green homes; a lot of green developments these days. So yeah, everybody’s looking for something green.
TOM: Now let’s talk about what actually – what does the green home mean because I think that it’s – we’re getting to the point where …
LESLIE: What is green to you. (chuckling)
TOM: Yeah, what is green to you. I mean there’s different shades of green. There’s light green and medium green and heavy green.
LESLIE: Neon green for those super hippies.
TOM: When you set out to do a green house, what are trying to achieve?
MIKE: You’re trying to build a sound, quality home and take kind of a holistic approach; not just energy efficiency but you’re looking at indoor air quality …
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
MIKE: … you know, health issues. You’re looking at design, livability, material resources. I mean so there’s lots of different aspects that you have to look at when you’re building a green home.
LESLIE: Now when you’re dealing with a factory-built situation, are you able to sort of adapt any style of your home to a more green standard or situation or is it really certain models have to stick with certain types of building specifics?
MIKE: You could build a green home in any type of home. You know, it’s just a matter of what you want and what you’re looking for but, you know, basically you’ve just got to look at the materials you’re using and you just have to have the knowledge. You have to investigate, you have to learn, you have to understand what the materials are and what you’re using and how they affect the environment.
TOM: You really have to take responsibility to do the research right now.
LESLIE: That’s what we’re finding. It’s up to the builder or the homeowner to do the research and ask specifically for this is the purpose that I want and why I want to call it green.
MIKE: Absolutely and there’s lot of great resources out there. We partner up with the Florida Solar Energy Center here in Florida and they’ve done a lot of helping us understand how to build green homes.
TOM: Now is your home that you constructed here solar powered?
MIKE: The home that we have here has a solar hot water heater system on it.
LESLIE: Oh, fantastic.
MIKE: It doesn’t have photovoltaics but it does have a solar hot water heater system.
TOM: Now what if you’re remodeling your home? Do you think it’s possible to really make a commitment to just, with respect to the new products, go green on the remodel if you have an existing home?
MIKE: Well sure, because you can put – when you’re remodeling you can still use green products. You can use caulks and paints that have no VOCs in them. You know, when you’re remodeling …
LESLIE: Even adhesives.
MIKE: Yeah, even adhesives. Exactly. You’ve got to look at those things. And you know, there’s nothing that says when you’re remodeling you can’t put on a solar hot water heater.
TOM: Yeah, good point.
We’re talking to Mike Draper. He’s a professional builder with 30 years of experience constructing factory-built housing.
And your other home that you built here is one called the comfortably affordable home. What niche is this designed to try to go to?
MIKE: Well, this particular house is about 1,767 square feet. So that’s a green feature, really, because it’s smaller; you’ve got less square footage that you’re trying to air condition and heat. So from that standpoint that’s part of the design of doing something that’s green. But we like to say too that green can be affordable. It doesn’t have to be expensive. And this home, excluding lot, it runs about $75 a square foot.
TOM: Wow, that’s great.
LESLIE: Oh, that’s very affordable.
TOM: Let’s talk about storm resistance. Is that built into these homes?
MIKE: Both of the homes that we built were built to 140-mile-an-hour wind standards. So very strong.
TOM: Now tell us what’s going to happen. You’ve constructed these homes in the parking lot. Now they’re actually going to be disassembled and then moved to foundations? Is that correct?
MIKE: That’s correct. We’ll have about three days to disassemble them and get them out of here and then we’ll take them – we’ll be taking them to the builders that have bought the houses and be setting them on a foundation.
LESLIE: And do these become sort of a show house for them at that point or do these actually go to an owner?
MIKE: Well, a lot of times the builders that buy the home buy them for themselves.
LESLIE: Oh, really? (laughs)
MIKE: So as they come on the lot. Come with a lot of great features.
TOM: Well, they know they’re built well. (Tom and Leslie laugh)
MIKE: They know they’re built well.
TOM: They had a lot of critics here at the builders show checking out their handiwork.
MIKE: Absolutely. Well they know these houses have to go down the highway about 75 miles an hour …
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
MIKE: … so if they can withstand that they can withstand just about anything.
TOM: Absolutely.
LESLIE: I mean that’s pretty amazing. So even the affordable home is built to green standards. It’s nice that you’re incorporating a lot of this green technology and ideology into something that works for every price point.
MIKE: Absolutely. Like I said, green can be affordable.
TOM: Fantastic.
Mike Draper, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit. Interesting story.
MIKE: Thank you.
LESLIE: Alright, well here’s something we learned this year at the International Builders Show. The single most cost – blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. (Tom laughs) The single most cost-effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from your home is to properly insulate it and if you’re not sure if your home has enough insulation or even the right type – I know it gets kind of confusing, especially depending on where you live – we’re going to tell you what you need to know, next.
TOM: That’s right. More from the International Builders Show coming up right after this.
ANNOUNCER: This portion of The Money Pit is brought to you by Aprilaire, makers of professionally-installed, high-efficiency air cleaners. For more information, go to Aprilaire.com. Now, here are Tom and Leslie.
TOM: Making good homes better, this is The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: And we are broadcasting a special edition of The Money Pit today from Orlando, Florida; the site of the 2008 International Builders Show.
LESLIE: That’s right. There is a million square feet of show floor here that we have been pounding the pavement and, boy, our feet are killing me. (Tom laughs) I have to say. But before the break we were talking about one of the simplest and most cost-effective ways to green up your home and it’s really all about the insulation.
TOM: And nobody knows insulation like Owens Corning. Gail Tedhams is Owens Corning’s Director of Sustainability and she joins us now with some tips on how to insulate your home properly.
Hi, Gail.
GAIL: Hi, how you doing?
TOM: We are excellent.
Now, insulation is one of those projects that is just so doable for the average person and …
GAIL: It absolutely is.
TOM: … it gets easier and easier as time goes on. And one of the things that I think is interesting is that most people don’t understand that they don’t have enough insulation because we’re continually changing the standards.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
TOM: That’s correct.
LESLIE: Well, and the insulation changes. It compromises itself over time so it does need some sort of updating, correct?
GAIL: Well, actually fiberglass insulation keeps its insulating power throughout its life, but as we’ve understood about energy efficiency, adding more insulation and having a higher r value is recommended now. Even some homes that are recently built they built to a minimum standard and you can gain more energy efficiency if you have a higher value of insulation. The Department of Energy recommends it for your attic to have around an r49 for most parts of the country.
TOM: Now what does that mean in terms of inches?
GAIL: For r49 you need to have at least 15.5 inches of bat insulation …
TOM: Mm-hmm.
GAIL: … or if you have the loose-blown fiberglass insulation you need to have 18 to 20 inches.
TOM: Wow.
GAIL: So you …
TOM: You need more of the blown-in insulation.
GAIL: That’s right.
LESLIE: Is it because it’s lighter?
GAIL: It’s fluffier, yes.
TOM: Right, more air is contained inside of it.
GAIL: So …
Now, this is obviously the idiot’s question but (Tom chuckles) if you have more insulation you’re using less heat therefore more energy efficiency?
GAIL: It’s less heat transfer through the – whether it’s the ceiling or the wall or the basement. And so, you can keep the heat in in the inside of your house when you’re warming and also keep the heat out in the cooling climate when you’re using your air conditioner.
TOM: Now let’s talk about ventilation. Sometimes I find that when you take …
LESLIE: They work hand in hand.
TOM: Yeah, they work hand in hand and sometimes I find when people add a lot more insulation they don’t really address the ventilation in the attic space.
GAIL: Yes.
TOM: Now it’s important to keep that insulation dry, isn’t it?
GAIL: It is and it’s important to make sure that your vents don’t get blocked.
TOM: Right.
GAIL: When you put the insulation in there’s usually soffit vents that are along the eaves of the house …
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
GAIL: … and you want to make sure that those remain open so that you have that ventilation up the roof deck onto the top ventilation that you have; usually a ridge vent or an end vent in your attic.
LESLIE: Now just short of going up to the attic and measuring, which obviously you should be doing, what are visual cues that you can sort of just take by poking your head up into the space?
GAIL: Well, the attic is the best place to look because it’s usually accessible and you can go up to your attic and if you can see the top of the floor joists …
TOM: Right.
GAIL: … or the beams running across you probably don’t have enough insulation.
TOM: Right, mm-hmm.
GAIL: Because that’s usually only eight to ten inches at the most. And so take a ruler – and we have rulers at the home improvement stores. You can measure how much insulation you need and we tell you. We also have a calculator on our website, InsulateYourAttic.com – InsulateYourAtticNow.com – and that’ll give you information about how to measure and how to figure out how much insulation that you might need.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm. Now once you sort of even up to the floor joists, do you want to then go perpendicular …
GAIL: Yes.
LESLIE: … and cross it so that you don’t see them at all?
TOM: Mm-hmm. Yeah, the layering of this is important.
GAIL: That is the best way.
TOM: You don’t always go parallel with the joist.
GAIL: Yeah, so if your floor joists are full …
TOM: Right.
GAIL: … then you want to go back over the top the opposite way …
TOM: Right.
GAIL: … so that also insulates that board or that wood structure …
TOM: Right.
GAIL: … so you don’t get heat loss through that.
TOM: Now here’s a question. When you have existing insulation is it ever a good idea to remove the old insulation and then sort of start with new insulation?
GAIL: You really don’t have to. If it’s in good shape it’ll …
LESLIE: Even if it’s super squished?
GAIL: Well, if it’s squished you might want to fluff it up …
LESLIE: OK.
GAIL: … if it’s bat insulation; if it hasn’t – if it’s been smashed down because you were storing something up there or something. (Leslie chuckles)
TOM: Right.
GAIL: So you want to make sure that it’s fluffed up, but you can just put more insulation right on top of it. Now what you want to make sure of is to get the unfaced.
TOM: Right.
GAIL: You don’t want to put that vapor retarder, that craft paper, down …
TOM: Right.
GAIL: … because then you would have a vapor retarder between the layers. So just use the unfaced.
TOM: We’re talking to Gail Tedhams – she’s Owens Corning’s Director of Sustainability – about the importance of insulating your home.
Now Gail, what if you wanted to sort of carve out some space for storage? You think it’s OK to maybe – say you go up to your attic stair and maybe that area that’s four or six or eight feet around that, kind of leave that with less insulation so that you can put plywood down and store there but then step it up towards the exterior walls?
GAIL: Well, as long as you can get the thickness of insulation you could put something on top of that. But you would have to know that that then would be in the unconditioned space of your house, so you wouldn’t want to store anything up there that might be not good for cold weather, for example.
TOM: Let’s face it. We’ve all got too much stuff. (GAIL and LESLIE laugh) We’ve got to use every space we have. But I do find …
LESLIE: It’s usually the step before the garbage, the places (ph) that go up there.
TOM: I’m advising this as another solution; as a better solution than trying to put stuff on top of the insulation, which is never a good idea.
GAIL: Yeah, you don’t want to smash it down …
TOM: Because that compresses it.
GAIL: … because you lose some of the insulating power then.
LESLIE: Well, that’s all really great tips. I mean I know we’re in a situation at home where we need to get up there and really do some work to our insulation. If you do want to sort of fluff up the existing fiberglass and add more, is the technology or the material – has it changed where you really don’t need to be as protective of your skin, respiratory, eyes?
GAIL: Well, let me tell you about our product. We are GREENGUARD certified, which means we test our product for emissions so you don’t have to worry about indoor air quality with our products. We also – we do recommend that you wear gloves and a long-sleeve shirt …
TOM: Right.
GAIL: … because the attic is really a dusty place, usually.
TOM: Yeah.
GAIL: So, you know, with doing that kind of work we recommend those kind of protective gears when you’re doing the job. But our fiberglass insulation is very safe to use and – so no problems there.
LESLIE: That’s great.
TOM: And it’s got a tremendous return on investment. The website, again, is InsulateYourAtticNow.com. Lots of tips, advice, calculators.
LESLIE: Good, which is what people need.
TOM: (overlapping voices) What you need to know. Absolutely.
Gail Tedhams from Owens Corning, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit.
GAIL: My pleasure. Thank you.
LESLIE: Alright, well every year we get a first look at some of the trends that we can expect in home construction and design and one thing that we’ve learned this year, along with upgraded kitchens, are outdoor porches and fireplaces are fast becoming the must-haves on the house wish list.
TOM: That’s right. According to the National Association of Realtors, fireplaces have a strong and positive effect on the value of the home, adding – check this out – about 12,000 bucks to the home’s worth. And one of the easiest, most cost-effective to dress up an old or outdated fireplace is to give it the look of stone. In fact, there’s actually a very beautiful cultured stone fireplace here in the high-tech house.
LESLIE: Yeah, and that’s another Owens Corning product. It’s so gorgeous and the cultured stone, it’s a manufactured stone veneer. It’s got the look and color and feel of real stone without the weight or the cost or the need to complete redesign your fireplace and it exactly mimics the look of the natural stone from which they were molded right down to the smallest detail.
TOM: Now if you do want to complete replace or even add a brand new fireplace to your home there are a lot of benefits. It’s a cool way to go green, add zone heating and, of course, there’s nothing like gathering around a toasty warm fire. It’s just a fantastic focal point for the home.
LESLIE: That’s why Hearth Technologies is the world’s largest supplier of manufactured wood and gas fireplaces. We’ve got Dave Miller who is the brand manager for Heat & Glo joining us.
Dave, welcome to the program.
DAVE: Good morning. Thanks for having me. Tom?
TOM: Well, it’s a pleasure to have you here and here’s a phrase you don’t often hear with fireplaces: zoned heating.
LESLIE: How crazy, right?
TOM: Yeah, you can zone fireplaces now, huh?
DAVE: That is right. See the fireplace actually is a furnace in and of itself. You can duct five-inch ductwork off the fireplace and put [in an adjacent home] (ph) into the garage or someplace else other than the actual spot that you’re installing it. So, don’t think of heat right where you’ve got it but think of it as a mini heater to areas around that space.
LESLIE: So you’re encouraging smaller, decorative, detail-oriented fireplaces perhaps in every room of the home.
DAVE: That’s the way we’d like it.
TOM: Yeah. (Tom and Leslie laugh)
DAVE: There is a – you know, heat where you want it, when you want it. It’s kind of a green message in and of itself. Instead of having the fireplace – I’m sorry, the furnace – run as a whole heating the home, if you’re going to be in your great room for a couple hours and turning a fireplace on at 30,000 BTUs versus your furnace at 100,000 BTUs makes some sense. So, the other side of green is the green you can be saving.
TOM: Absolutely. And you know, your fireplaces also are some of the most beautiful I’ve ever seen. You showed me one yesterday that almost looked like the flame was coming out of a wet rock.
DAVE: Yep.
TOM: What was that?
LESLIE: Oh, how pretty.
DAVE: Well, I’ll tell you what, Tom. It’s really more to do with fire art …
TOM: Yeah.
DAVE: … maybe than the traditional fireplace. Traditional gas fireplaces have been trying to replicate wood burning.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
DAVE: OK, so we’ve got a lot of those products at Heat & Glo but the trend now is to do something other than simulate wood burning and that’s when you break the rules. You’re basically talking about things like European design; rocks; other media like glass, marble, things of that nature that the flame is coming out of and really provide a decorative installation.
LESLIE: Now we get a lot of calls about gas fireplaces on the show and people often refer to non-vented gas fireplaces and they just seem like a really bad idea. Is there such a thing even?
DAVE: There’s a downside to unvented because something has to happen when you have combustion. So the by-products typically can help or hurt, I should say, the house in terms of moisture and mold.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm, what about health?
DAVE: So you need to be cautious with that. And yeah, it can impact the indoor air quality without a problem.
TOM: And congratulations to Heat & Glo because you guys refuse to make non-vented fireplaces and that’s fantastic.
DAVE: (overlapping voices) We’ve taken the high road on that, Tom. We believe that it’s just not in our best interest because they are outlawed in about 12 states right now and we see that that’s not getting any easier for the states that do have them. So …
TOM: And the entire country of Canada as I recall.
DAVE: That’s correct. Yep.
LESLIE: Well Canada’s always ahead.
TOM: Right. So you guys, all your fireplaces that are direct-vent though we should explain that what that means is it’s actually very easy to add one with not a whole lot of space and you showed us one yesterday that only took like 12 inches of wall space.
DAVE: Yeah.
TOM: Depth of wall space.
DAVE: Flexibility and installation are kind of the main drivers in a gas fireplace. They are seal-tight combustion so they’re not taking any indoor air to combust. They’re taking 100 percent outside air. And then the vents nowadays have become very small. You’re talking six-inch diameter; eight-inch diameter. They can be horizontally vented out the side of the wall or up through the roof. And then if you have an extreme application you can power vent or draft assist. So there’s no reason not to put one of those in and then it eliminates the chase and the whole – the dollars involved with that type of assembly.
Tom: Mm-hmm.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm. And so because it seems like it’s such a small and efficient system, you really can – this doesn’t have to be a new construction installation. You can just retrofit this anywhere.
DAVE: Yeah, they’re great for remodels. As Tom mentioned, the small footprint is shallow. It’s 12 inches. Allows for easy installation and smaller application total (ph).
TOM: And what’s the clearance on that? Is it pretty much a zero clearance situation?
DAVE: Yeah, we call them zero-clearance fireplaces because the product itself defines your clearance to combustible.
TOM: So you need no space.
DAVE: Put them right on a wood floor.
TOM: (overlapping voices) You put them right on a wood floor. Amazing.
DAVE: Yep, yep.
LESLIE: And what if you don’t want to go with a gas fireplace? What about biofuel? Any options there?
DAVE: Absolutely. You can get into pellet, corn, cordwood, things like that. So, there’s those options available and pellets never been easier. You can have those bags delivered right to your door nowadays. It’s like adding water softener pellets to – you know, to a water softener.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm. I remember they used to be so hard to find and now they’re just so readily available.
DAVE: Very much so. Just about any fleet (ph) and farm store carries these type of products and …
LESLIE: Mm-hmm, and they burn so clean.
DAVE: Renewable (ph).
TOM: Energy efficient and beautiful.
Dave Miller from Heat & Glo, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit.
LESLIE: Thanks.
DAVE: Tom, thanks for having me.
TOM: Well, if you’re like millions of Americans you’ve been caught in the dark during a widespread power outage.
LESLIE: And while it used to be an annoyance, now it can be something much more, like a revenue loss for your home-based business.
TOM: Learn how you can avoid being without power, right after this.
(theme song)
ANNOUNCER: The Money Pit is being brought to you by Owens Corning, a world leader in building materials and composite solutions. Learn more at OwensCorning.com. Now, here are Tom and Leslie.
TOM: Making good homes better, this is The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: Coming to you from the International Builders Show in Orlando, Florida. Now, if you’re like millions of Americans, you’ve probably been caught in the dark during a blackout. Years ago it was just a nuisance. You sort of had to just wait it out.
LESLIE: Yeah, but today not so much. You know, so many telecommuters and home-based businesses are around these days; not to mention folks with lifesaving machines that rely on electricity. So today a power outage can mean lost revenue or even safety issues. And joining the program now is Dan Giampetroni – good lord, I should have read your name before I just announcing you (Tom laughs) – from Generac Power Systems.
Welcome, Dan. Fellow Italian, I guess.
DAN: Thank you, Leslie. That wasn’t good bad. (Leslie laughs) I’ve heard a lot worse. (Tom laughs) I’ve heard a lot worse.
TOM: Well, Dan, I’ve got to start with the fact that I actually several years ago …
LESLIE: Tom has one. He brags about it all the time.
TOM: … installed one of your standby generators – a Guardian –
DAN: Mm-hmm.
TOM: – and 12K. And I’ve got to tell you it is the best thing. Once you have a standby generator you never want to be without one because fact of the matter is that electrical systems are not as reliable as they used to be. The infrastructure is getting strained and stressed and it’s failing and breaking down.
DAN: Yep.
TOM: And it’s not always because of a major power event like a storm or something like that. Are you seeing that more from your perch?
DAN: Yeah, I think usually, you knot, Mother Nature probably plays the most havoc on the electrical grid but, you know, the other thing that’s going on is the demand is outpacing the supply. You know, in 10 years from now, you know, this country, if it doesn’t catch up with it, we could have a lot of problems; you know, brownouts and rolling blackouts like that happened in California years ago. But Mother Nature is still the biggest one and it’s not just hurricanes down in the southeast. It’s, you know ice storms and what happened in Tulsa and Oklahoma just a couple of months ago …
TOM: Right.
DAN: … and Seattle before that. So it’s all four corners of the country.
TOM: Well let’s talk about the technology and explain exactly what we mean when we say standby generator.
LESLIE: I mean it seems highly complicated.
TOM: Yeah. I mean the word standby is exactly that. This is a device that stands by and is ready when you need it …
DAN: Mm-hmm.
TOM: … and it works with the help of something called a transfer switch. So why don’t you talk about that?
DAN: Correct. It’s permanently installed outside your home. Looks similar to a central air unit.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
TOM: Right.
DAN: And then it wires into your electrical panel and it splices into your gas supply; natural gas or propane.
TOM: So it’s not gasoline powered? So you don’t have to worry about …
DAN: (overlapping voices) It’s not gasoline. It’s not diesel. You’re not refilling gas cans back and forth from a gas station that might not have power.
TOM: Right. Or gas that goes bad after 30 days.
DAN: Or it goes bad, correct.
LESLIE: Or gas infiltrating the home and causing health issues.
TOM: Mm-hmm.
DAN: Yeah, yeah. There’s all sorts of advantages to natural gas and propane. So whatever your fuel source is at your house, that’s what it’s going to run off of.
TOM: Right.
DAN: And then you could be away on vacation. Everything’s automatic. Everything’s hands-free.
LESLIE: So you wouldn’t even know this is going on.
DAN: No, there’s no manual starting. There’s no running extension cords. Everything is completely automatic and hands-free, like I said. It senses utility power. And so when utility power goes away, for whatever reason, it will automatically send a signal to the generator to start up and then once the generator is up to speed the transfer switch will switch over from utility power to generator power and then those circuits that are protected in your house are then powered up by the generator for a continuous amount of time. It could be two hours. It could be two days. It could be two weeks.
LESLIE: For however long that power outage is out.
DAN: For however long the power outage is happening.
LESLIE: Now when the power outage occurs at the home, say it’s even only for minute, what is the time frame that has to pass before the standby generator kicks on.
TOM: How fast does it kick on?
DAN: Yeah, it’s about 20 or 30 seconds.
TOM: Wow.
DAN: And we design it that way to make sure that it actually is a power outage.
TOM: Right.
DAN: A true power outage. Because sometimes a voltage drop …
TOM: Right.
DAN: … could send a false alarm and you don’t want this thing going back and forth like a ping-pong game.
LESLIE: Right. So even if the power is only out for, say, five minutes after that, it’ll kick back off after that short duration of usage.
DAN: It’ll kick back off. It constantly senses utility power so when you utility power returns it’ll then automatically shut off the generator, go back to utility and then it’ll go right back into standby mode. So if an hour later the power went out again the same thing would happen.
TOM: We’re talking to Dan Giampetroni. He’s with Generac Power Systems and they manufacture the Guardian standby generator.
Dan, before we let you go I want to talk about this new transfer switch that you guys have. Now I know when I installed my system I had a separate box for a transfer switch. You guys have just invented, basically, a new electrical panel that has a built-in switch.
DAN: Mm-hmm, we worked with our partners at Siemens and it’s a standard 200-amp, 42 circuit-load panel that’s in most homes across the country.
LESLIE: So it replaces your existing panel.
DAN: It can replace your existing panel. A new construction it could be the panel that’s put in by the electrician …
LESLIE: OK.
DAN: … or if like say during a remodeling project you have to upgrade from 150 amp service to 200 amp service. That would be another great time to put this panel in.
TOM: It’s all built in, it’s clean, it’s one panel.
DAN: Yeah, and then it has an integrated transfer switch right into it. So if you opt for standby power at the time of that construction project, it’s actually the easiest and least expensive way to install a generator from the electrical side.
TOM: Fantastic.
Dan Giampetroni from Generac Power Systems, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit.
LESLIE: Thank you.
DAN: Thank you, too.
LESLIE: Alright, well Tom I’ve noticed we’ve been getting several inquiries lately on soundproofing and all these townhome dwellers have common walls. It’s really a big problem.
TOM: And those wives who don’t want to lose sleep during her husband’s poker night as well (Leslie chuckles) I’m sure play into that. In fact, noise is the most common complaint people have about their homes. Up next, we’ll tell you about some new technology that will help you quiet that problem, after this.
(theme song)
ANNOUNCER: The Money Pit is brought to you by Rheem water heaters. For dependable, energy-efficient tank and tankless water heaters you can trust Rheem. Learn more at SmarterHotWater.com. Now, here are Tom and Leslie.
TOM: Welcome back to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show where we make good homes better. I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: And this very special edition of the program is broadcasting from Orlando, Florida; the site of the 2008 International Builders Show. It’s bigger than ever this year with a million square feet of exhibition space.
LESLIE: That’s right. It’s the place to be if you’re a construction professional. If you’re not, sorry; you’re not invited to this party. (Tom chuckles) But we are your inside scoop deliverers. We love to share all of the information that we’re learning here and we’re broadcasting from the front porch of the high-tech home in the show village which is outside in not-so-warm Florida today (Tom chuckles) for some bizarre reason. And it’s all courtesy of our friends at Owens Corning.
TOM: Well, every year there are a couple of breakout trends that we get the early buzz on here at the builders show and one of them this year is that a third of homebuyers say a workout room is a necessity in their home. They really want to have it to be completely part of the home and the basement is a perfect place to do this. And one of the quickest and easiest ways to turn your unfinished basement into a living space is with a finishing system and Owens Corning actually has one that’s professionally installed. And you can have your home gym up in like two days.
LESLIE: (chuckling) That’s really fantastic. And one thing that you’re going to need for your workout room is definitely soundproofing if you like to listen to loud music to get you motivated. In fact, you’re probably going to want this for lots of rooms in your home.
TOM: Well, according to the National Association of Homebuilders noise is the number one complaint that people have about their homes. Kevin Surace is from Quiet Solutions.
Kevin, thanks so much for being with us today and you’ve got a really innovative product that can actually help quiet a lot of rooms.
KEVIN: Thank you, Tom. Yeah, we think so. QuietRock is a soundproof drywall and it’s a drywall that goes up like regular drywall and – except one of these pieces of drywall, which we’re hanging on the little samples here – is equivalent to about eight layers of standard drywall acoustically.
LESLIE: Interesting.
TOM: Wow.
KEVIN: And so the question is how does that work.
TOM: How do you get that …
KEVIN: (overlapping voices) Well, boy, if I knew I’d be a scientist, wouldn’t I?
LESLIE: (overlapping voices) Well, and it doesn’t look as thick as eight pieces of drywall.
KEVIN: No, it isn’t. It’s regular half-inch and five-eighths inch. So you wonder how that works. Well, this works by converting acoustic energy to heat energy …
LESLIE: OK.
KEVIN: … with some physical properties called viscoelastic polymers that are buried inside this type of drywall. So even though it weighs the same as regular drywall, you or your contractor can install it like a regular piece of drywall and it’s the same as putting up six or eight layers of drywall, which you’d almost never do because the cost of …
LESLIE: Well, because how much space would you lose in a room. (chuckles)
TOM: Right.
KEVIN: You would lose too much space and it’s very expensive to do that.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
KEVIN: Both in time and money. So, it’s really been a revolution in the way that people can soundproof for their media rooms, their bedrooms, their bathrooms, the baby’s room.
TOM: And the noisy kid rooms. (chuckles)
KEVIN: The gym rooms that – you know, all of the above.
LESLIE: And you would do it on all six surfaces in the room? Floor, ceiling, everywhere?
KEVIN: Well, that’s a great question. It really depends. So for instance, in a basement, obviously, a ceiling would be important. But if you’re on second floor your ceiling might not be important …
LESLIE: Right.
KEVIN: … because it might go to the outside world, right? So, you really have to look at all of those things. In a media room it’s often all six surfaces or five of those six.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
KEVIN: But in other rooms it might be just the walls around the bedroom for instance. Maybe you don’t want to hear your kids practicing trumpet or practicing drums or something like that.
TOM: Right, well what I love about it is it’s as easy to install as any other drywall application, right? Do you need any special fasteners or …
KEVIN: No, there’s no special fasteners. You know, look, there have been technologies from the 60s of things like resilient channel or sound clips or mass-loaded vinyl or some of these other, older techniques that actually don’t work as well. They’re very hard to install in the field. They’re more expensive to install in the field. They take up more room and it’s just hard to do. And the idea with a soundproof drywall is all the technology is already built into the drywall itself. So, the consumer doesn’t have to worry about how it works and how to hang it and their contractor doesn’t have to worry about that. It’s just drywall. You hang it and it works.
TOM: The product is …
LESLIE: Is there any difference in weight? I’m just wondering.
KEVIN: No, there’s no difference in weight. No, because it’s not done with mass.
TOM: Fantastic.
KEVIN: It’s done with damping. It’s an internally damped drywall.
LESLIE: Fantastic.
TOM: Product is called QuietRock. The company is Quiet Solutions.
Kevin Surace, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit.
KEVIN: You bet, thank you guys.
LESLIE: Thank you.
TOM: Fantastic.
Well, we’ve mentioned that Americans are looking for more green products and ways to go green and, in fact, in an effort to both save the planet and save some money too one thing that families are always looking for are products that are safe. And there’s another innovation here from Mythic Paint. They make a product that is a zero VOC, zero toxin paint, that you can feel good about and Leslie, you and I actually had a chance to try this out.
LESLIE: Uh-huh. I actually used it in my home because my husband and I are expecting a baby this year and we used it in the nursery and actually I did all the painting myself. And we’ve got Rocky Prior who’s the company’s president and chief science officer because it really is quite a technology.
Welcome.
ROCKY: Thank you. It’s good to be here.
LESLIE: You know, it’s a beautiful paint and it really is ultra durable and no VOCs, no toxins, no solvents even when you’re custom tinting a color, which has been the problem with other manufacturers.
ROCKY: Correct. Most consumers are not aware when you go to a paint store and you pick out that favorite color usually there’s a significant amount of solvent in that latex coating and there’s solvent even in the colorants themselves and they’re toxic solvents. If you read the back of a paint can it will have a warning on it saying it contains carcinogens.
TOM: Right.
ROCKY: And our product does not contain any toxins or solvents known as VOCs.
LESLIE: Regardless of color or finish.
ROCKY: Correct. Any color that you want we can match any color from any manufacturer as well as we have our own color palette.
TOM: Well, when we opened up the cans there’s also almost no odor. It’s a very strange experience for those of us that do a lot of painting.
LESLIE: Well it’s funny because I needed to replaster my ceiling and of course, being pregnant, no one wants me on a ladder. So I hired a pro to come in and do that for me and we used your primer and your white paint for the ceiling. And I kept catching him smelling the paint brush (Tom and Rocky laugh) and I was like, ‘Otto!’ I’m like ‘It doesn’t smell.’ He’s like, ‘It’s crazy.’ And then when I painted the wall surfaces, you know, I felt confident and comfortable that I wasn’t damaging myself or my future son. It’s a beautiful product. You offer 1,200-plus colors. I mean congratulations.
ROCKY: Thank you very much. We have a lot of people with paint on their noses because (everybody laughs) …
TOM: Well, the product is called Mythic Paint and it’s founded by the Southern Diversified Products Company. If you want more information on this fantastic product you can go to MythicPaint.com. Their …
LESLIE: And best of all, if there’s no retailer in your area they will ship it to you for free. (INAUDIBLE)
TOM: Absolutely.
KEVIN: Right. And all of our colors are online at MythicPaint.com.
TOM: Rocky, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit.
You are tuned to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show broadcasting live from the 2008 International Builders Show in Orlando, Florida.
Up next, humidity control can be – humidity can actually be your home’s worst enemy. We will tell you what to do about it after this.
(theme song)
ANNOUNCER: The Money Pit is being brought to you by Owens Corning, a world leader in building materials and composite solutions. Learn more at OwensCorning.com. Now, here are Tom and Leslie.
TOM: Welcome back to The Money Pit Home Improvement Radio Show. I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: This very special edition of The Money Pit is broadcasting from Orlando, Florida today. No, we did not take a vacation to Disney World. (Leslie chuckles) But we are in the happiest place on earth for construction pros; the International Builders Show.
LESLIE: That’s right and we want to say a huge thank you to our friends at Owens Corning who have made this broadcast possible today and we are on the front porch of the high-tech home here in the show village with the latest in lighting controls to the most exciting media rooms to the choicest luxury finishes and appliances. This house will excite and challenge builders to deliver their very best on a daily basis.
TOM: Well, and you may not have the most high-tech home yourself but you still want it to be comfortable and energy efficient and not cost you an arm and a leg to heat or cool. And humidity can actually be your home’s worst enemy when it comes to all of those things, including energy-efficient cooling; not to mention the health hazards that moisture problems can certainly create.
LESLIE: That’s right. Joining us to tell us more about that is Dave Reifsteck from Aprilaire.
Welcome.
TOM: Hi, Dave.
DAVE: Thanks. Hey, hi guys. Thanks for having us.
TOM: You guys do something really interesting in that you actually control the humidity throughout the entire course of the year. You help us put moisture in the home to make it more comfortable in the winter but you also have an innovative product that takes it out in the summer.
DAVE: That’s right. We’ve got a product that will give you total home dehumidification, central dehumidification year round independent of what’s going on with your heating or cooling system.
LESLIE: Oh, interesting. And now since it’s a whole-home capacity, say if you need more moisture control in a below-grade room; if you’ve got a basement. Can you sort of divvy up the moisture control between that? Because you might not need the moisture control throughout the rest of the house all the time.
DAVE: Well, in a basement application – I guess what you’re talking – in the winter time when you need more humidity potentially upstairs, there’s a whole-house humidifier that will actually put the moisture in. But if you only need the moisture taken out of the basement because it’s typically below grade and that’s where you may have more moisture issues …
TOM: Right.
DAVE: A central dehumidifier can simply, in essence, spot dehumidify that basement …
LESLIE: Interesting.
DAVE: … and, in another point in time, when I start conditioning the upstairs or the upper levels of the house, it can close a couple of dampers and now dehumidify the upstairs if it’s needed.
TOM: Wow, so you can essentially have zoned dehumidification – zoned humidification then dehumidification so you maintain just the right amount of moisture in the house.
DAVE: That’s right. Year round. Because the ideal moisture level would be somewhere between 30 and 50, 55 percent.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm. And the unit senses the levels itself. It’s not the responsibility of the homeowner to be like, ‘OK, basement today. Second floor tomorrow.’
DAVE: It has intelligence built into it that knows – it’ll sample the air to determine if I need to start dehumidifying or if the air in the house is good enough or the humidity level is low enough it won’t run.
LESLIE: Now why is it so important to think about – thuh, my tongue tied (Tom laughs) – dehumidification in the summer time? Because you know, when you’re air conditioning you don’t usually think about moisture but it’s moisture that can really make you feel uncomfortable, correct?
DAVE: Yeah, I guess the best way I can relate to it, most of us can relate to some time in the summertime late in the evening after I’ve gone to bed. At some point in time you get uncomfortable.
TOM: Right.
DAVE: And someone’s got to get up and go out in the bedroom – or out in the hallway – and turn your thermostat down. Really, what it is it’s the humidity; it’s not the heat. My temperature has been satisfied but as the evening progresses the humidity load starts increasing in the house. So the beauty is that this product really takes over where the air conditioning stops.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
TOM: And what I read about your product is that it actually takes out 90 pints of water a day. That’s a lot of water and you would think that the air conditioner does that pretty well but it’s actually a pretty inefficient dehumidifier.
DAVE: Yeah, the primary purpose of an air conditioner is really to address temperature.
TOM: Cool. Right.
LESLIE: Mm-hmm.
DAVE: Heat it up or cool it down; cooling with air conditioning. So, the primary purpose is to affect temperature. The primary purpose of this product is to address humidity and take it out.
TOM: Fantastic.
Dave Reifsteck from Aprilaire, thanks so much for stopping by The Money Pit.
Well, we have just about wrapped up our broadcast here from the International Builders Show coming to you courtesy of our friends from Owens Corning. That website again, to learn about the energy efficiency that you can improve in your home is InsulateYourAtticNow.com.
I’m Tom Kraeutler.
LESLIE: And I’m Leslie Segrete.
TOM: Remember, you can do it yourself …
LESLIE: But you don’t have to do it alone.
(theme song)
END HOUR 2 TEXT
(Copyright 2008 Squeaky Door Productions, Inc. No portion of this transcript or audio file may be reproduced in any format without the express written permission of Squeaky Door Productions, Inc.)
Leave a Reply