hello it's michael church with crawl
space ninja comm and today i want to
show you a crawlspace that we took care
of in strawberry Plains Tennessee and
for those of you that aren't familiar
it's about a northeast of downtown
Knoxville before I get started on that
though I wanted to let you know that
crawlspace ninja is officially expanding
into Chattanooga beginning October so if
you are watching this video from the
Chattanooga area I just wanted to give
you a heads up that if you need a free
assessment or anything like that in
Knoxville area all the way to
Chattanooga area we are in those areas
now and hopefully we'll be coming to an
area near you soon
so just praise the Lord for that for
helping us to grow and a lot of this is
due to YouTube and the different things
we've been able to share so thank you
very much so let's get right into it
basically met with a homeowner very very
nice people he did a diagram for us some
of the things I want to show you about
this is he tried to correct the
situation himself doing what most people
do following the advice of you know
companies that are all about fans and
ventilation and all that sort of thing
so they had installed and Adam at mocs
fan I think it was what it's called or
something like that and you can see here
we've got a fan we've got a closed vent
and a fan closed vent fan closed vent
fan fan and then he's got a
recirculation fan right here that's
basically blowing air in this crawl
space and then this vent is closed so
he's got one two three four five fans
these are drawing air in these guys are
pushing air out so we're trying to
create a flow through the crawl space
like this the other thing that's unique
about this house it's about a 2,000
square foot house and they built it very
good they actually poured
footers here and here so these are
cinderblock walls access here here which
is the ductwork so your crawl through is
here and here and this is the door so
anyway I wanted to show this is a garage
front porch road and all that's out here
so I wanted to show you a few things
about this situation after I believe a
few years maybe less time the crawlspace
became and stayed humid so the fans
didn't really do a lot the fans that he
had also had a humidistat on there so he
could tell what the humidity was so
let's move along to the next slide
basically I like to show everybody a
picture of the door so you can tell even
before going in there this is what it
looks like nice door he he had his own
little frame and everything that he had
made so that was very nice then you get
into the crawlspace and this is what
you're seeing right here is your
humidity sensor just a standard vapor
barrier and you can see water intrusion
through the bottom part of the block
right where the block is sitting on the
footer it gets worse the further back
you go but he did have standing water
coming into the crawlspace and you can
see right here how dark and muddy this
vapor barrier is around this pillar
because water was actually either coming
along and percolating here or it was
just coming straight up out of the
ground
either way we addressed that here's
another shot I actually pulled the vapor
barrier back and when I did I thought
this was a snake at first it's not it's
not it's actually just a piece of metal
but again you can see this here one of
the things you got to oh he also had
this vent closed one of the things if
you're trying to sell your house a home
inspector may notice water intrusion see
how the blocks a different color that is
typically something that they're gonna
note on a home inspection now I did pull
the vapor barrier back at the day I was
there there wasn't not a lot of standing
water but you can see again this is that
pillar I was telling you about you can
see the watermark the F
essence right here and then the
mud-stains so then we get a little bit
open part this is that ventilation fan
in the front part of the crawlspace I
was telling you about but look right
here all of that you can see watermarks
all along so he had quite a bit of water
intrusion
coming up higher through the block now
even though this wasn't adding a whole
lot of standing water what it does do is
it causes more humidity because this
block is actually evaporating moisture
through it and you can see the
stalactite is what I call it these areas
right here where the insulation is
starting to pull away from the main
insulation it was installed correctly
but whenever this humidity affects
insulation it starts to get heavy and
pull out of itself so if you start to
see a lot of stalactite a and you see a
little bit back in here you can see it
right there that's what I call it I
don't know what everybody else calls it
but so I took some moisture readings and
you can see we had a 22% wetness in the
wood all right so that's pretty bad
anything above 17 and 18 percent can
grow mold 20% or higher can grow wood
rot fungus by the way this little meter
if you like is on our DIY page it's
great little meter so it spinless so it
just you don't have to worry about
penetrating the wood but it's glow in
the dark and the red shows you hey it
beeps let you know you got issues it's
got a hardwood a soft wood a masonry and
a wall setting so it's got four
different settings but look over here
84% humidity with six fans I think it
was five or six fans so the fans didn't
do any good did I tell you we're in
Tennessee we're in East East Tennessee
it's humid in East Tennessee so if your
makeup air is coming from the outside of
the crawlspace so you're drawing air in
from the outside and that makeup air is
84% guess what the crawlspace air is
gonna be 84% so anyway there's nothing
wrong with ventilating a crawlspace that
your spa
to ventilate but you should control
humidity while ventilating so anyway
it's it's there's just a certain way you
got to do it which is you know the way
we do things around here so now look at
this oh my look at all that look at that
Oh what you think all that is I know
it's kind of hard to see but that strap
that was holding up it's a hanger that's
holding up the insulation was actually
rusted look at the stalactite in here
look at all that nastiness that's that's
wood that's not insulation look how dark
that is look at this I don't know what
that is I don't know what kind it is
because we didn't test it but sure looks
like some kind of fungal growth to me so
anyway so this is what happens whenever
you ventilate without controlling
humidity okay okay look at that whoa
that's that's pretty gnarly stuff there
and there there it is there's that one
that's rusted look how much that thing
is rusted over time there's another one
back there okay and then here's another
picture oh wait I jumped I jumped ahead
hang on don't look at that one yet look
at this okay so before I jump ahead here
to show you some after shots we went on
location to their house and took some
videos so I'm going to take a quick
break show you this video and then I'm
going to show you some after shots of
what the crawlspace looks like to
there should be no borders
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OPA
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okay so I'm here in front of the April
err 1830 the humidifier that tells you
what the current humidity is right now
it's fifty percent relative humidity so
if you're if the doors there you can
take a flashlight and shine in and it'll
tell you what the humidity is they also
make a remote for this it's a wired
remote that will hook up wirelessly so
you can actually run the controls to the
door and you can even control it with
your smart phone if you have Wi-Fi in
the house so that's a nice little
feature that Aprilaire does so anyway
let's go see what else is going on
okay a couple things number one as you
can see this was the block wall I was
telling you about that goes into the
other section of the crawlspace
well they poured a footer here so our
pipe is actually running underneath me
into the sump pump okay so the sump pump
is buried down in is surrounded by pea
gravel we use the flow tech five-year
Pro Series sump pump so it's got a it's
all cast-iron 5-year warranty it's
really nice it's a great great sump pump
it's a half horsepower very powerful so
we have three of these installed as you
can see we've got the tube running into
the dranzer drain and for those that
don't know we install a dragger drain on
in our sump pump lids and the reason why
we do that is if you ever get a leak
from above and it hits the vapor barrier
that water's got nowhere to go because
it's a big old swimming pool down here
swimming pool liner so what we've done
is we give the if there's ever a leak
which hopefully there never is but if
there is we give the water a place to go
inside the drain your drain so that's a
sealed system it's got the vapor barrier
actually tucked underneath the the lid
and if you notice also above the sump
pump there's one of our vents that's
been sealed up using our r10 foam board
and spray foam so it's a thermal barrier
as well as an air barrier that keeps all
the hot humid air and cold air out to
condition the crawlspace better so if
one of the other things since this is an
interior wall we did not insulate this
wall we only insulate the exterior walls
so this wall is does not need to be
insulated
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okay now we are in the farthest part of
the crawlspace we're a good probably 70
feet from the door now
there is no dehumidifier the
dehumidifiers in the front part near the
door so we've come through three
I'm sorry through two different doors
because as I mentioned before this crawl
space is in three sections so one of the
things I wanted to show you is the
humidity in here is the same as 70 feet
aware where that dehumidifier is so a
lot of people think that because a
crawlspace is sectioned off or things
like that you may need a lot of air
movement or dehumidifiers or extra
dehumidifiers or whatever and I would
rather you over dehumidifier than under
dehumidifier but at the same time as the
air gets dryer and that section of the
crawlspace it wants to pull the moist
air from this section that direction
moist air always follows dry air okay so
that's one of the nice things about
having a dehumidifier and again I'm not
changing anything you can still see it's
a now it's 50 so it's just depends on
where you put it low it's 49 high it's
50 something so it's it's a good system
as all I'm trying to say the magic
number is under 60 anything above 60 can
potentially start the mold growth again
we soda blasted as you can see all this
wood has been soda blasted this had
insulation all in it again it was so bad
I think I've got some before pictures
that I can show you so this was all had
insulation and everything in it and just
a lot of moisture trapped and
or actually had put in five or six
ventilation fans thinking that that
would fix the problem but if you've
watched any of my videos it depends on
where the air is coming from so if
you're pulling hot humid air from
outside and you're using 1 5 10 15 fans
it doesn't matter you still got a hot
humid crawlspace so I appreciate you
guys watching this video I hope this was
helpful
just kind of gives you an idea by the
way this is our 10 mil vapor barrier as
you can see it looks really nice so this
is directly on the dirt holds up really
good where we're real we like this vapor
barrier a lot we've also got a 12
milling with rocky or hard terrain that
could possibly puncture a vapor barrier
might want to upgrade to the 12 mil so
appreciate y'all watching this video let
me know if you have any questions please
like the video down below and hope you
make it a great happy and blessed day
thanks for watching
ok I appreciate you watching that video
I hope that was helpful Eric went with
me out there on that one so anyway we
took some great humidity readings I
believe it was in the in the mid to high
40s was the relative humidity along with
the wood moisture level I think was in
and again it was a couple days ago when
we shot that video but you saw it was I
believe 13 15 percent wood moisture if
not lower so that's great hopefully you
liked the way it looked so now let's
take a look at here's a before and after
shot again before after soda-blasting
look at that soda you can even see the
soda lines where the guys marked it up
man that looks great when they go to
sell this house inspectors not gonna
give them any problems at all this looks
wonderful now some people might think
well why didn't you put insulation back
between the joists I don't like
fiberglass I think it's it's a nest for
rodents and raccoons and possums and
mice and snakes follow him and all kinds
of stuff so what we do is we insulate
the walls behind the vapor barrier so
that's how we insulate it we use an
ar-10
termite resistant foam board so that way
we don't have to worry about getting
termites up the walls or anything like
that now it's not an excuse not to have
your termite treatments and all that
sort of thing it's just a nice thing we
do a little add-on is to add the arctan
foam board in there we still leave the
termite gapper code still ventilate per
code we still have to insulate per code
so don't think that this is a non
insulated crawlspace because it is
alright and then I'm going to show you
one last before and after picture so
here's your before this is the same
space by the way this is that pillar
right there
okay so we trenched all along the entire
foundation you can see the sump pump
sitting right there and I don't know if
you heard if you remember but I showed
you that that crawlspace was actually
three different crawl spaces so we
couldn't connect those three with the
trench and and our easy flow pipe we
actually had to do three different
perimeter trenches with three different
sump pumps because of how the house was
built built very well but unfortunately
we had to stall install three different
systems had the humidity set on about 50
percent this is our April air 1830 very
very quiet dehumidifier going into the
condensate pump condensate pump goes up
and drains into the sump pump sump pump
pumps all the water out we got our foam
board behind the wall over here all of
our pretty r10 non-reinforced no cat pee
guarantee vapor barrier before/after
raptor pillars real good everything is
real nice and clean we've got a crawl
space ninja protection sign up there so
anyway I hope you liked this video hope
it's a good representation of what we do
when we do the corner to corner
inspection of the crawlspace before
making sure that we check everything the
only other thing I would maybe recommend
that they do eventually is get the ducts
sealed at the main trunk there was a few
areas where the ducts could have been
sealed a little better but this this
crawlspace is going to be protected for
a long long time I hope you liked this
video please if you get a chance like
the video down below
and I hope you make it a great and
blessed day we'll see you later Thanks
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