[FC] (FC) Carpet in Garages

[Greg & Virginia]

Ben & Everyone:  I'm not sure your purpose in wanting to put a carpet in your
garage, but have you given any thought to just putting in a dehumidifier?  You
can buy a new one for about $150.  I used to also be a member of the local
Lincoln club.  (The Lincoln club hosted dinner parties, the Corvair club hosts
tech sessions.)  A member & his wife had a collection of over 100 Edsels &
Lincolns.  Their storage building was a large structure that looked somewhat
like a barn, but was new.  They used the earth's internal temperature (which I
believe is somewhere around 55 degrees) to keep the building both cooled and
heated.  When the building was built, the footer was about 5-6 feet (yes
feet!) deep, to capture this natural temperature.  It was very well insulated,
and the inside temperature varied very little year around.  The trick was the
insulation, about four ceiling fans (to keep the air circulating), and two
industrial sized dehumidifiers.  I was there once on a blistering hot day, and
it was very comfortable in the building.  I know this may not help you right
now, but it is something to keep in the back of your mind if you decide to
build your own garage, or storage building some day.  I'm pretty sure that you
would also need to build the structure fairly large (to capture the earth's
natural temperature).  I don't think it would work in a two or four car
structure.  They heat and cool some houses in a similar manner.  I saw an
article on this within the last year in Fine Homebuilding magazine.  Greg