Installing Venting Through Cold Attic

If you vent through a soffit where attic vents are often located the moisture will get sucked back up into the attic or roof venting.

Installing venting through cold attic.

Having a vent in each side of the gable was the typical attic ventilation configuration in older houses but today it is considered woefully inadequate for an efficient house. Adequate attic ventilation is important to reduce your utility bills and avoid damage to the roof and attic. From up on the roof use a jigsaw or reciprocating saw to cut a 4 in. Leave the drill bit sticking through the roof so you can find the hole.

Attach the roof vent to the duct that is from the top of the roof. The soffit vents are now installed but you still need to make sure there s no insulation blocking the new vents. Your roofer will build this frame just a little larger than size of the vent leaving 1 8 inch of extra room on each side. In of vent opening per 150 sq.

Installation first requires a wood frame made of 2x4s installed from the attic between two studs. If there s blown in insulation like ours rake back the fluffy stuff with a 3 or 4 ft long 1 x 6 or use a garden rake or hoe. You are then back to sticking the vent to the wall with the brackets and screws. The warm moist air inside the vent tends to condense on the colder walls.

There are different kinds of vents. Start in the attic and drill a hole through the roof in the desired vent location. Soffit vents the narrow horizontal section on the underside of your roof eaves. First determine your attic area by multiplying the length by the width.

Then aim for about 1 sq. Use rigid metal ducting aluminum or galvanized steel with lengthwise seams facing up and joints sealed with foil tape or duct mastic or rigid plastic pipe. Venting the soffits is often done by installing continuous strip vents between the soffit boards or by adding rectangular and round vents at regular spacing between the rafters the easier option for existing soffits. You can attach the pieces together in all the holes by using the clamps that you have.

You will then install the dryer vent through the hole that you have just made. The standard is one square foot of venting for every 150 square feet distributed evenly between the soffit and roof vents. The attic is usually colder than the rest of the house during the winter and that can create a problem for a dryer vent. Try to keep it close to the fan location.

The number of vents in your roof will depend on the size of your attic. The building code lets you reduce that by half under some conditions but more roof ventilation is usually better. A 30 x 40 ft. Install half of the required vent area in soffit vents.