Nancy, I've looked and looked through the This Old House website. They have thousands of products listed and I haven't found the one you were talking about yet but I'll keep going through the list. GGG, thanks for the info. I totally know how a crawl space "should" be insulated but this one is so shallow no one can fit under there to do the work. That is the reason the weatherization guy said dirt is the only answer. It truly does need more dirt to create a slope away from the house for drainage but I think it needs something more. I am just imagining something added to the base of the house and that will stick out from the stucco siding and look weird. See the stucco goes all the way to the ground and then has dirt over the bottom edge. Thin Man, when you are thinking about modern building practices you have to take into consideration that this house was built 126-145 years ago buy the pioneers. The county records show that the age is unknown which means that it was built before the town incorporated. We are celebrating the 125th birthday of our town this summer. I would bet that the house was framed with cottonwood or lodge pole pine and that at least the base of it is made from red cedar. The lodge pole pines are indigenous to this area and the other two were planted by very early settlers and during the homestead period and were called tree claims. I would also bet that the stucco on the house is made with river sand and probably wasn't added until the 20's or 30's. The pioneers used what materials were available to them. The houses here all have numerous additions to them because during good times people added on or they added on out of necessity to house their children or to take in boarders. It's kinda funny, it's like a time warp here. Honestly, people are finally having to re-roof their homes and buildings to get rid of the original shake shingles that were used way back when. Those who didn't do the re-roofing when it needed to be done now have buildings that are rotting and caving in. We have low rainfall, sandy soil and no termites in this country and I think that is the reason for the longevity of these houses and buildings. Oh Sierra, I feel so badly for what you are going through. I had a neighbor just like that when I lived in the city. She went so far as to accuse my husband of running her off the road. When it went to court she was 70 and my husband had longish hair and though they had no proof at all, the judge bought her story and sentenced my husband to six months. I had just had my back surgery and was not able to care for my self yet and there I was with three little kids. It was AWFUL! I say it isn't worth it. Move now and find your dream house somewhere else! Really!! Irene, very good information, thank you. I did read up on EIFS. There were numerous lawsuits and class action suits in 2003-2004 because the product, while being an excellent insulator was so good that it didn't allow any trapped moisture to escape. This caused the studs and other woods used in the building to rot. They used the product on almost all new buildings for a period of time. I know that the product system now has a weepage system built into it to eliminate that problem but you are correct in that it must be place 6-8 inches above soil level. So after much research and a sleepless night, what I have decided to do is: move my gardens to the veggie area, let my Aunt go ahead and pile dirt up around the foundation. Close up that weird crawl space area they dug out and fix the cellar door and insulate it as much as possible. When I buy the house in two years I'm going to finance it with a USDA Rural Housing loan. This will allow me enough money to buy the house and do any repairs up the amount that I qualify for based on my income. In this case it will give me about $10K for repairs. At that time I will pull the dirt away from the house, insulate with the highest R-value sheets that are available and then build raised beds with stone all the way around the house to cover the insulation. I would have to put a drip edge along the top of the insulation and seal it all very well and then check it frequently to make sure it staying sealed. The other option is to stucco over the insulation and have a little ridge all the way around the base of the house, which might look weird but may be the more long term way to go. Of course I could add the raised bed against the stucco too and that would cover the ridge. Any thoughts on that? MeMo

Typically heaters like that one use the igniter spark rod to also sense that the flame is present. The flame control box sends out a signal to open the gas valve, and spark the igniter. Once those two things have occurred, there should be a flame present at the burner. If the spark rod is being used to sense the flame on your model, then it's possible that the ignition wire to the rod is defective and isn't sending the signal back to the flame control box that there is flame present. So basically the heater lights fine, but once the built-in delay circuit in the flame control box has elapsed, the gas valve shuts off the gas flow because the control box is being told that there's no flame. The ignition wire can be "good enough" to spark the igniter rod, but yet still not send a millivolt signal back to the flame control box to let it know that the burner is lit. Of course, the flame sensor portion of the flame control box could also be defective. Some models also use an air-proving switch to let the flame control box know that the fan is running. If an air-proving switch is open though.....the heater won't light at all. We rent out heaters in all kinds of weather and conditions, and they usually aren't finicky about operating at all.....until operators muck them up somehow. The most common operator-induced muck up is screwing around with, or eliminating, or changing out the regulator between the heater and tank without knowing what they're doing. The gas valves on these heaters are usually set up so they have to pull open a plunger against whatever the inlet pressure to the heater is. The reason manufacturers do that, is to prevent a heater from running at all if the inlet gas pressure is too high. The little magnetic solenoid valves only have enough ooomph to pull the valve open if the inlet pressure is close to what the rating plate says. The second most common muck up, is inadequate propane supply. You can't expect to run a 150,000 BTU heater in zero degree weather with it attached to a 20 pound barbecue grill cylinder. The heaters themselves are pretty reliable......if all of the label and operators manual recommendations and specs are adhered to, that is. ;-)

I've used all sorts of electric heaters. I like some better for certain situations. Had a little fan/heater combo that was nice and small and I used it in the bathroom for a while, then quit using one in there. But it was great to warm up the cab of the pickup in cold weather and terrific to carry when I was traveling. Motel rooms are usually quite cold in the winter and warm in the summer. Nice to add some heat in the winter and circulate the air in the summer. For the kitchen I used an oil filled radiator type for a while. It's nice for an even heat rather than the on and off of the normal thermostatically controlled electric ones. BUT, the downfall of the oil filled units is that if they're cold, they have to heat the oil, then the oil has to heat the metal parts on the radiator and fins, and only then will it start to radiate out some heat. And yes they get hot. So you don't get fast heat out of them and they're not good for a short use. Then a conventional heater is preferable. As far as efficiency, they're all similar except with the issues with the oil filled ones I imagine the net heat out of it would be slightly more expensive to operate. I've quit using portable heaters and just let my furnace zone heat my house. Shut off the heat register and close the doors in rooms I don't use and I put up a heavy quilt over the doorway into the kitchen. The thermostat is in the main area I heat (living room and hallway to the bathroom) and it works well. I keep it about 70° in the living room, the kitchen is probably 5° less and the closed off rooms are very noticeably colder, which doesn't matter - they're not used. And my heat bill is no higher than when I used to keep it 61°-63° in the house.

An interesting idea, but, for the reasons you have identified, it could be something you come to regret. It just seems like a lot of work and expense for something with modest benefits. In my view, it would be a pain to have them located in a crawl space where they won't be as easily observable for leaks, etc., so you'll have to remember to crawl in there to do regular inspections. Further, installation now and any future maintenance and/or changeout in a space like that would not be fun.