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Smitty2025
Member
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# Posted: 24 Mar 2025 01:09am
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Hey! New member here.
I have an A-Frame cabin up north of Prince George, BC Canada. We have 4 seasons here and after owning my cabin for a few years now, I am thinking of insulating to allow for more winter time visits. We are able to stay overnight with the wood stove going until about -15C, otherwise the cold comes through the roof makes it hard to heat.
2 years ago, I put on a metal roof. I left the shingles on, strapped it with one by four, wrapped it with vapour barrier under it, and in hindsight, I should’ve insulated on the outside. The cabin is on an island so it is hard to get rid of materials. That is why I left the shingles on.
The exposed beams are beautiful in the inside and I don’t want to cover them up. What are your suggestions for insulating? I have thought about doing closed cell spray foam, rigid polystyrene or insulation with a vapour barrier.
Any help with this would be great!
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Brettny
Member
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# Posted: 24 Mar 2025 06:44am
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Take the roof back off and insulate with foam under it then put the roof back on. What kind of insulation do you have now? Do you have wall and floor insulation?
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Smitty2025
Member
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# Posted: 24 Mar 2025 09:38am
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It has 3/4 plywood and than tar paper, shingles, strapping and metal roof. And yeah the roofs never coming off…that was a PITA to do. The floor is insulated already. Nothing but the plywood for insulation
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travellerw
Member
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# Posted: 24 Mar 2025 10:42am
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I don't know how you would insulate and still have those nice beams. Spray foam will look like hell if you don't cover it up. Also the skill of the installer will be a huge thing to ensure it doesn't get all over.
One option I can think of is cutting 4" foam to go in the bays, then cover that with G1S plywood.Your bays look to be about 8" deep so that will take up just over 1/2 and still leave a beam look. That will give you about an R21 including the interior and exterior plywood.
Your loft will become an absolute sauna though. I imagine its already pretty uncomfortable when the stove is running full, but with the insulation it will become unbearable. I suggest a big industrial fan to continually mix the air. It was a game changer in our cabin and makes our main floor and loft very close to the same temp (within 1.5C of each other). It also reduced out wood usage since we didn't keep loading wood in until the main floor felt comfortable.
In any event, I hope you keep us updated as I would really like to see how you tackle it.
P.S. Your cabin looks amazing and PG, BC is a pretty darn nice place.
P.P.S. In case someone doesn't know, G1S stands for "Good One Side"
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Grizzlyman
Member
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# Posted: 25 Mar 2025 08:25am
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How how deep are your beams? I would imagine it will feel quite a bit smaller if you insulate and cover between them. It looks like your’e utilizing that space between the beams already so that would be gone and you’d have to figure out shelving and storage somewhere else. Without knowing the dimensions of your A-frame assuming you lose 6” all the way around you’re going to be giving up a significant amount of volume in the cabin- probably about 10% especially in The loft. Even if you can’t walk and move in those bays necessarily, you still feel that space.
If you have enough insulation with the shingles and roof as is to get to -15 comfortably I’d probably just be okay with that vs giving up the space and the feel of the cabin as is. . Otherwise as travellerw mentioned that’s probably about the only way to do it.
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