Drains Are Good Hangout for Worms

Q: I have a problem with our shower. I do not see mildew or mold, but every two weeks or so, if I don't spray the shower with bleach, I find small, slender worms of some sort. Where are they coming from?

A: The worms are most likely the larvae of a common house gnat, or they could be carpet beetle larvae that have wandered from the beaten path. The gnat's larvae like to hang out in dirty drains or in really wet soils of houseplants and of course carpet beetles like, well, carpet.

Any time you have an infestation problem that requires chemicals or pesticides, you need to hire a licensed pest control company. Household chemicals, even bleach, can be hazardous if used incorrectly, and as you already know, the bleach is not solving the problem.

Q: Our house was built in 1968. We had more insulation added in 1978 and storm windows installed. In December 2003, we had a new 90 percent furnace and air conditioner installed. We had the contractor insulate the ductwork, which is in the crawl space, thinking we would have less heat loss.

However, we have been having trouble with condensation in a couple of the rooms the greatest distance from the furnace, and the floors are cold. Did we make a big mistake installing the ductwork? Should we have the ductwork put back like it was originally? Until we had the ductwork insulated we had none of these problems.

A: While reading your question I knew what your problem would be by the second sentence. You have the classic "last-in syndrome," or the last person working on the home caused the problems you are experiencing.

A 1968-style home usually had no insulation in the walls and maybe a little in the attic. The windows, doors and uninsulated walls leaked so much that the home exchanged all its stale moist air two to three times a day with fresh outside air.

By sealing the home with new windows and adding insulation in the attic, you lowered the rate of this air exchange. You also installed a high-efficiency furnace, which takes all its combustion air from outside the home, eliminating the chimney effect that normally brings fresh air into the home through other openings in the walls and ceiling.

Although making your home more energy-efficient is preferred, it shouldn't come at the cost of allowing the house to breathe. It's possible to seal a home so tight that it's like living in a Baggy. There's no fresh air, so you continually re-breathe stale exhaled air. The rooms farthest from the furnace contain cold air, and cold air cannot hold as much moisture as warm air. What you see as condensation is really excess moisture. Warm the air and it will absorb the excess moisture.

A new furnace should be able to warm the rooms unless the furnace fan or ductwork is not sized properly or the return air from the rooms is limited or nonexistent. Insulating the supply ducts simply prevents the loss of heat through convection to the crawl space air and should not have such a major effect on the room's air.

You need a second on-site opinion from a licensed heating vent air-conditioning technician or engineer before proceeding.

Write to C. Dwight Barnett at d.barnett@insightbb.com.

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