Hi all again:
I am still on wall cavities, and materials that were used throughout the years before all these so called wonderful modern insullations hit the news.
The heated area of mills used solid 4by 4's one on top of the other, nailed and plastered into the wall cavities. This 4 inches of wood plus the exterior sheating added up to a good rfactor.
these rooms were very warm indeed, and were healthy to boot!.
Another early school house dating to 1820's used brick filled walls, up against outside 1" boarding, and then beautiful 16" t&g beaded pine boards on the interior walls, nailed to vertical furring strips. the walls were 8" thick, and the window and door frames were set in place as the walls were laid, talk about a beautiful thought out plan. the building was a timberframe structure.
Another shop that I helped restore used strips of cedar split from rail fences, held in place with wood pegs and plastered in the wall cavities, on the inside the walls were vertical furred, and plastered on top of horizontal wood lath, this also was a very warm building and seemed easy to heat in cold weather.
My own philosophy is to learn as much as possible about the tried and proved methods, and incorporated as many of these techniques into a modern home.
I realize that stone and brick will transmit cold from an exterior wall, but if you look closely at the walls the old people constructed their methods included a centre cavity to break this transmission, with a few bonding bricks or stone, to tie the two walls together.
Food for thought
It is hard to fight the modern march of progress
NH
