CardinalInsulation

Insulation removal

Tampa Bay, Florida

Insulation removal in Tampa Bay

Wet, moldy, or rodent-damaged fill comes out. Dry, thin fill stays and is topped to R-38. Removal is not included in a blown-in price. Call (561) 654-7698.

Map of the Boca Raton shop. There is no Tampa Bay pin. 4263 NW 1st Ave, Boca Raton, FL 33431

What has to come out

Tampa Bay here means houses in Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Clearwater. Removal is a vented house attic, often South Tampa 33606 and 33609, Hyde Park and Palma Ceia, when the fill is wet or nesting. Downtown towers are not attics. St. Petersburg's older houses under shade trees can be. The beach towers are not.

What stays

A dry South Tampa attic is a seal and a blow to R-38. There is no Tampa pin. The drive from Boca Raton is long. Call and say the city, not just the bay.

Getting the bags out

Older plaster lids are the risk. A removal that puts a foot through a Hyde Park ceiling is a failed day. We look before we vacuum. Clearwater and Tampa are not the same appointment.

How the day goes

  1. Look

    The hatch in Tampa Bay gets opened before a truck is promised. Depth, moisture, and whether the mess is the whole attic or one bay.

  2. Protect

    The rooms under the hatch get covered. The bags stay on the path that was agreed. A plaster or wood lid that is already soft stops the day.

  3. Remove

    Ruined fill is vacuumed into bags and hauled off. The deck should be visible where the bad fill was. Dry fill next to it is not taken just to make the attic look empty.

  4. Next

    Sanitizing only if the insulation was contaminated. Then the holes that are finally visible get sealed. Then new insulation to R-38. Those are not one price.

After the deck is bare

Foam is a roof-deck decision on a house. It is not a product for a condominium, and it is not the automatic replacement after removal. Sanitizing, if needed, is the bare deck. Call (561) 654-7698 and expect the travel to be part of the quote.

The install that follows is blown-in insulation in Tampa Bay. Contaminated decks are attic sanitizing, a separate page. The contractor, separate from this tear-out, is the insulation contractor in Tampa Bay.

Questions

When do you remove insulation in Tampa Bay?

Tampa Bay here means houses in Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Clearwater. Removal is a vented house attic, often South Tampa 33606 and 33609, Hyde Park and Palma Ceia, when the fill is wet or nesting. Downtown towers are not attics. St. Petersburg's older houses under shade trees can be. The beach towers are not.

Is insulation removal included in a blown-in price?

No. Removal is its own price. A planning range for new fill does not include bagging out the old insulation. Sanitizing, if the fill was contaminated, is a second price. The new blow is a third.

Where is the shop for a Tampa Bay removal?

There is no shop in Tampa Bay. The crew comes from the Boca Raton shop at 4263 NW 1st Ave, Boca Raton, FL 33431. Call (561) 654-7698.

Measured against the Florida code

The attic numbers, not a brochure

The 2023 Florida Building Code, Energy Conservation, Table R402.1.2 sets a climate zone 1 ceiling at R-30 and a climate zone 2 ceiling at R-38. Cardinal installs R-38 and checks the inches. A Florida page that lists R-49 to R-60, or R-3.2 to R-3.8 per inch for both fiberglass and cellulose, is using a different book. Table R402.4.1.1 says air-permeable insulation shall not be used as the air seal.

Quotes are prepared by Russell Y, a building scientist, BPI certified, and certified to perform blower door testing. When the door is run, the result is air changes per hour at 50 pascals, the method in R402.4.1.2. That section limits new houses in climate zones 1 and 2 to 7 ACH50. An insulation job on an existing house is not automatically that test. We report the number only when we measured it.

Insulation numbers Cardinal uses against the Florida code
ItemNumberWhat it means
Zone 1 ceiling, Florida codeR-30 minimumPalm Beach and Broward
Zone 2 ceiling, Florida codeR-38 minimumNot R-49 and not R-60
What Cardinal installsR-38, depth checkedAbove the zone 1 floor
New blown fiberglassAbout R-2.5 per inchNot R-3.2 to R-3.8
Settled fiberglassAbout R-2.2 per inch4 inches is about R-9
New celluloseAbout R-3.6 per inchDenser. Still not an air seal
Open-cell foamAbout R-3.6 per inchA roof-deck product
Closed-cell foamAbout R-6.5 per inch2 inches is about R-13

The attics on this page

Tampa Bay on this site means houses in Tampa, St. Petersburg, and Clearwater. South Tampa, 33606 and 33609, Hyde Park and Palma Ceia, are the attic jobs. Downtown towers are not.

A vented South Tampa attic is an air seal and a blow to R-38. There is no Tampa pin. The drive from Boca Raton is a long one. Call and say the city, not just the bay, because a Clearwater house and a downtown tower are not the same appointment.

Foam is a roof-deck decision on a house. It is not a product for a condominium. St. Petersburg's older houses under shade trees are attics. The beach towers are not.

The code in Tampa Bay

Tampa Bay covers Hillsborough County and Pinellas County. Table R301.1 lists both as climate zone 2A. The zone 2 ceiling minimum is R-38, not the zone 1 floor of R-30. Neither county publishes an attic R-value of its own on this site, and there is no Tampa pin.

Hillsborough and Pinellas are not in the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone. Section R806.2 of the 2023 Florida Building Code, Residential, sets the net free vent area at 1/150 of the attic. The exception is 1/300 only when 40 to 50 percent of that area is within 3 feet of the ridge and the rest is in the bottom third. Insulation cannot close the soffit. R806.3 requires at least 1 inch at the eave vent.

The county zone is Table R301.1. The Boca Raton worked example, including the vent math, is the building code page. Cardinal still installs a vented attic to R-38 and checks the depth.

Blown-in insulation, the full pageResidential insulationWhich insulation belongs in a Florida houseWho writes the quoteHow a South Florida attic actually works

CallGet a quote