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Just finished watching the 1929 version of Taming of the Shrew with Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford, terrific movie and now going to bed because in the morning my son and I are going to pick up a machine to blow insulation into the attic. 60 bales, should be quite an adventure and a hell of a lot warmer as there's little to no insulation up there now and the house is always cold. (Winter here)
Then I'm going to finish a little more firmware for my autonomous rover and start the 2 of n article.
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I have done the cellulose insulation job a couple of times for myself and friends and have a few tips.
1. Make the store plug the machine in and test it before you drag it home. Those things get abused and either the blower or auger may be faulty.
2. Make sure you use some type of breathing protection. The paper masks are better than nothing, but I prefer a half-face respirator. This is most important for the guy on the hose end.
3. Set up a fan to flush the air out of the room (probably the garage) where you have placed the auger-box and accessed the attic. This really helps with the fine dust that is inevitable.
4. If you are feeding a long distance or will be making some tight bends with the hose, you may clog the hose. A 25-50 ft electrical fish tape reel works well to feed through the hose and clear the clog. A yard/leaf blower also helps with this.
5. Clean-up. Sweeping this stuff is a pain. Get the big piles out of the way, open the doors and use a blower to send it to the neighbors. 
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Thanks for the tips, I've never done the blown insulation but a lot of the Batt type and know that breathing apparatus is essential and by it's nature that the cellulose will be a mess.
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You are welcome.
I forgot the most important tip, do not let that stuff get damp as it will clog the auger or hose. This may seem obvious, but it is easy for some to get damp due to condensation. You buy it from nice warm store, bring it home and set it on a cold concrete floor. The bottom of the bag cools down to the dew point and you get clumpy material. Same goes but if the person feeding the box is cleaning up spills on the floor.
The nice thing about cellulose versus fiber glass is that while messy, it does not come with the itch factor. 
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TnTinMn wrote: do not let that stuff get damp
I hadn't really thought about that but when they delivered it yesterday they unloaded it onto the front porch which is concrete and we brought it in the house and put in a spare bedroom.
Thanks again!
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Do not blow the insulation onto/into the external soffit vents and clog them. You can buy plastic chutes or just bend pieces of cardboard to create air channels to let air come into the vents and into the main attic space.
I did mine years ago and have never had an ice damn since.
I have snow on my roof longer than anyone else in the neighborhood (which means I have the best insulation).
Steve Wellens
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Just got done doing the insulation.
We got the machine set up on the back porch hauled about 30 bails out and it started to rain. So we hauled all the bales just inside the door covered the machine and waited about 30 minutes until it quit. We uncovered the machine and I wiped off best I could and put a fan on it for about 30 minutes.
Fearing the worst we started and didn't have a bit of trouble except for a big freakin mess which is cleaned up and we are taking the machine back now.
Thanks for the tips!
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Good job!
It sounds like your attic access was from inside the house (ouch, that is rough). If you dealt with rain and did not get a clogged hose during the process, you have done very well. 
This is probably not an issue for you, but when you were in the attic, did check to see if there where any improperly ducted bathroom exhaust fans(i.e. just venting directly into the attic space)? If there were any, put that onto your list of things to fix soon, before it causes a water problem with the attic space now being cooler.
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TnTinMn wrote: This is probably not an issue for you, but when you were in the attic, did check to see if there where any improperly ducted bathroom exhaust fans(i.e. just venting directly into the attic space)? If there were any, put that onto your list of things to fix soon, before it causes a water problem with the attic space now being cooler.
There was an old fart fan in the guest bathroom venting to the attic that I replaced and vented to the soffett earlier in the week.
The only thing I have left to do is the wiring up there, it is rigged very poorly but it's right next to the access so I will do it at a later time.
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I am watching (on tv) Australia bat with the Poms just avoiding the follow on.
Peter Wasser
Art is making something out of nothing and selling it.
Frank Zappa
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Trying to work out if I'll ever feel my fingers again after shovelling snow. It's been...chilly.
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You're not stuck in Toronto, are you ? It's very warm, even in Tassie. A trifle windy, though....
Christian Graus
My new article series is all about SQL !!!
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If he was in Oz, wouldn't it be rather odd for him to be shoveling snow?
Software Zen: delete this;
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Yep - I'm back here doing time.
I'm innocent I tells ya! They have the wrong man!
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Chris Maunder wrote: They have the wrong man!
That's not what the hamsters say, and the surveillance video seems to have about 18 minutes erased.
Come on down to AZ and "work" remotely; it's about 75°F all weekend. Well, the daylight bits, anyway.
Will Rogers never met me.
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Just finished coding and testing a postfix to RPN formula system for a new software I'm working on, as well as all the API and user documentation. Now I'm working on more of the spec and keeping my notes in sync with the design.
Also watching Archer on my DVR, waiting for the new season to start Jan 13. Wife works in the morning so I'll do some more coding until lunch. Rest of the weekend is chores, Packers vs 49ers on Sunday which I'll mostly listen to, and preparing for the -21 degrees F on Monday (-40 or something with windchill forecasted).
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Omphaloskepsis.
“There are obvious things, and there are many obvious things no one tried, because no one needed to try them.” Sergey Alexandrovich Kryukov, January 1, 2014
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BillWoodruff wrote: Omphaloskepsis.
I had to look up that one, sounds like a good way to spend an afternoon!
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It's still Friday evening here. I am rather tired after fighting my way South to our place in Baja. This trek has become significantly more challenging after the main road to town collapsed last week[^] (sorry about the paranoid web site in my link, but it has the best collection of pictures of the road). It's an elephanting mess.
Arrived only to find the wife in a rather foul mood. I swear her eyes looked like Anakin Skywalker's when he is turning to the dark side. 
As far as Saturday afternoon (tomorrow) is concerned, I might look at a side project I have been offered. Everything is in the very early stages. I asked what kind of overall requirements they had, such as web interfaces and was told they wanted it completely proprietary and closed. 
Soren Madsen
"When you don't know what you're doing it's best to do it quickly" - Jase #DuckDynasty
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Oooo! It did a bit, didn't it? 
That's...um...challenging. Especially for the couple of trucks at the bottom which might be a bit late with the last delivery of the day... Poor buggers! Musta given 'em a bit of a shock - are they OK?
Never underestimate the power of stupid things in large numbers
--- Serious Sam
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It was actually just one truck with a trailer (both filled with cement) that slid down with the roadway without injuring the driver. Essentially that truck triggered the collapse, but it would obviously have happened at some time anyway.
Soren Madsen
"When you don't know what you're doing it's best to do it quickly" - Jase #DuckDynasty
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No you arent. You are posting crap on SB.
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SB ? I'm not posting to the soapbox at all ?
Christian Graus
My new article series is all about SQL !!!
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I'm sat in a garage while they replace the two front tyres on my car. And adjust the 'tracking', whatever that is.
Regards,
Rob Philpott.
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