Duct Work Complete + New Tool Purchase

Well almost. We need four 4 inch long screws to permanently secure the plywood. But R was intent on watching *** Favre whoop the Dallas Cowboys (and who could blame him) so the next time he makes a hardware run he will pick up the screws.

This is where we were at when I last posted.We next cut a piece of 2 inch thick pink foam insulation (from the scrap pile) to fit the opening. We used our table saw to cut the insulation. We get a nice edge plus it is the fastest method.We placed it in the opening and pressed the insulation into the ends of the two ducts.
This left an impression.Using a piece of duct that is the same size. We marked the insulation. We cut out the holes using a jig saw after drilling a 1 inch pilot hole for an opening to start cutting.
We ended up with this. We used the cut out insulation as a template to cut out a piece of plywood (from the scrap pile)to fit the opening and the ducts.
We removed the insulation and plywood so that we could install 2 adjustable elbows and then inserted the pink insulation back in place.This left us with a female end on the adjustable elbow and female ends in our remaining spare duct.
We anticipated this problem and purchased crimping pliers to put the ridges on the duct to make it a male end. This tool was just under 15 bucks and can also be used to put the crimped ends on downspouts. The tool does all the work and strength is not needed. Move along overlapping one ridge which will keep your spacing equal.We then moved on to attaching the remaining ducts, making sure to screw and tape each joint.
This is what it looked like after the last duct was installed. We also used strapping to support the ducts.But what about the plywood piece??? We cut the plywood into two pieces before we reinstalled it. We needed to do this because the adjustable elbows needed to be at a slight angle to line up with the existing duct. The pink foam insulation was pliable enough to get over the elbows but the plywood was not.
Here is the finished project. Keep in mind that before this the opening was basically exposed to outside temperature air which kept the basement slightly above freezing in the winter. This also was a freeway for mice, spiders, and whatever else that felt like crawling into the basement.While we were finishing up we noticed another piece of duct that was slightly askew where it attached to a floor register duct. R was unable to install a screw because of the floor joists so we opted for adjusting the duct as best we could and then taping. I can't say enough about the aluminum tape. It is less than 10 dollars for a large roll and easy to install. A quick trip around your furnace while it's running will tell you where you are leaking expensive conditioned (heated or cooled) air. Look for leaks at points where one duct attaches to another. I found numerous leaks along the trunk line because the large rectangular duct is actually made out of 2 L shaped pieces. This yields a lot of seams that could leak.

*** It was a great game and I was cheering for the Purple People Eaters (Vikings) to beat the Dallas Cowboys. Rarely will a person from Michigan cheer for a Minnesota team (never for the Twins!!!) but today was a rare occasion. So until the end of football season, the occupants of Gear Acres are Minnesota Vikings fans. Damn that was hard to say...but not as hard as this......

Gooooooo Vikings!!!!!