Ceiling insulation required?

I'm in the process of setting up 2 flower rooms, on a flip, in the basement. Its pretty much 1 big room with a partition in the middle to create 2 rooms. All walls in these rooms will be insulted(exterior walls of the basement/house). The space has an ambient temperature around 65 degrees all year long. Above the space is the rest of the house, ambient temperature 69 degrees all year long.

Am I wasting money insulating 1000sf worth of ceiling joist?

I like to maintain close day and night temperatures. Do you think if I don't insulate the partition wall between flower rooms this will allow me to maintain higher night time temps as the room on the other side of the partition will be lights on? I'm thinking the answer is yes and why I'm also thinking of not insulating this partition wall... I want some radiant heat going into the other room.

Any insight is much appreciated... thanks!

I'd worry about smell. Insulate and then drywall the ceiling. A carbon filter is great, but the size rooms you appear to be preparing will definitely have odors up gassing into the house.

smokinrav said:

I'd worry about smell. Insulate and then drywall the ceiling. A carbon filter is great, but the size rooms you appear to be preparing will definitely have odors up gassing into the house.

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I'm actually not that concerned with smell. Rooms are sealed, I've got (2) 2 10" fans with can filter 100's on either end of the each room scrubbing the air. From experience that should be enough to clean the smell. Always have a couple Ona blocks on hand if I ever need them but its been rare. I usually just open 1 small block and place it in my furnace air return... treats the whole house.

2klude said:

I'm in the process of setting up 2 flower rooms, on a flip, in the basement. Its pretty much 1 big room with a partition in the middle to create 2 rooms. All walls in these rooms will be insulted(exterior walls of the basement/house). The space has an ambient temperature around 65 degrees all year long. Above the space is the rest of the house, ambient temperature 69 degrees all year long.

Am I wasting money insulating 1000sf worth of ceiling joist?

I like to maintain close day and night temperatures. Do you think if I don't insulate the partition wall between flower rooms this will allow me to maintain higher night time temps as the room on the other side of the partition will be lights on? I'm thinking the answer is yes and why I'm also thinking of not insulating this partition wall... I want some radiant heat going into the other room.

Any insight is much appreciated... thanks!

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I think the heat would seep through, but I'd be afraid that light would seep in the same fashion.

You said rooms will be sealed? I assume the ceiling also?? So vapour barrier every where.
heat rises so I don’t see any temp change other then the heat The lights will heat up the walls floor etc. This heat will stay longer if the ceiling is insulated.

edit Im high.So what Im saying is your rooms at lights off will be warmer with ceiling insulation.Also quieter up stairs.

So all the exterior walls will be insulated. Interior walls of the grow room, including the ceiling will be 1/2" osb, all seams will be either taped or caulked followed by black/white poly, again all sheets/seems tapes. I think the rooms themselves are going to be very well sealed.

I'm not concerned with light leaks between rooms, if there are it should be easy to fix. For light to leak into the other room its gotta go through mylar>osb>osb>mylar... essentially 4 layers of light leaks to make its way into the room next door.

I insulated for sound suppression.
If I can hear my exhaust coming on and off all night, I'd never sleep.
If that's important I'd do it.
At least insulate between each joist at the ends that meet an outer wall.
Super cheap and easy, but also most effective place to upgrade insulation.
I had an energy audit done and did this for under $200

Cookie Rider said:

At least insulate between each joist at the ends that meet an outer wall.

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This ^

Cookie Rider said:

At least insulate between each joist at the ends that meet an outer wall.

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For sure... actually its already done. Insulating the rim joist are standard code where I live.

Insulation is never a waste.

Well, for me it is/was. I'm now collecting free( and trade buddies a dime bag for the covers on there junk tubs out back, etc ) large size hot tub covers from all over the county to insulate the ceilings for my newest grow trailers. 4" + of closed cell foam that already usually comes up to 8 feet wide (the max legal width a trailer can be), and basically ready to hang!


Some ideas for you:

A set of 24v motorized dampers with cheap digital temp controllers/timers can make for a great flip flop-able ventilation system (without buying extra fans). The ability to switch the direction of air flow and have one centralized fan unit makes for a way better system, with less noise, and would be way more efficient overall.

If going sealed with a flip flop though.. I would build radiator like heat ex-changer cores out of stacked beer can pipe manifolds (one on each side of the partition wall) for the other rooms air to flow through, and exchange the heat from one side of the room to the other, without compromising the seal in any way. Basically a Heat Recovery Ventilator like exchanger, but just for the 2 flower rooms, and using 2 seperate cores instead of one, without actually echanging the air and losing c02 to the other room. You could use a single compact 2 way core, but will be a way more complex system and cost a lot to build.

Here is something that could easily be made, and probably out perform a $5000 HRV/ERV unit. I guess people would rather pay that much for a compact HRV unit than have a long ugly sewer pipe run around a room: You could do it in such a way that you could just reverse the flow from one room to the other when the lights flip.

My idea has been to integrate the DIY pop can air exchangers directly in the wall framing, whether it be a partition or exterior wall. The entire wall packed between the studs with the pop can tubes, not just one. That way, the wall itself is one giant mega core that is super effecient, and can drain any condensation down through the floor. Its like, heating the outside in fresh air, but 90% of the heat stays with you while you breath nothing but the fresh air. My wall designs will be composite/rot proof of course, and i'll have never ending stacks of cans/cores to replace every year.