[airics]

I have a Richmond American home - 3 story - approx 2500sf....so tonight while i was reading about energy conservation, i decided to see how well my home was insulated so i went up to my 3rd floor.

I have no entry into the attic, however i have 2 doors that open and you can see the furnaces as well as the roof. I noticed the cold and the wind howling.. anyway, i noticed some insulation on the interior walls but nothing on the "floor" or near the roof line.. i'll post a picture if you want... Is this normal... ? I am now considering blown in insulation, but there is no way to walk in this attic area, so the blower would really have to "blow" the insulation a pretty good distance (20ft?) unless there are entrances from the outside...

Does anyone know of an affordable company to do this? or is it easy enough to do myself? I have a feeling this is why I was getting monster sized bills last summer for electric..

[wwu123]

There should be insulation above the 3rd floor ceiling sheetrock, i.e. on the attic floor, usually thick rolled fiberglass between the framing members, and it should be pretty thick, like R-38 or higher (you can see the rolls at Home Depot).

It sounds like you are trying to look through maybe a furnace closet or something, and looking up it looks just open to the attic? Are the furnaces at the attic level or the 3rd floor level? If the furnace is on the 3rd floor, it may be just open to the attic above, but doesn't mean there's no insulation along the rest of your ceiling.

If the "floor" you're mentioning is in an uninsulated space, i.e. above is the underside of the roof, below the "floor" is an interior room on a lower level, then there definitely needs to be insulation. If it's missing, you are looking basically at the backside of the sheetrock of the ceiling below.