Peter,
Your non PT plate boards are separated from the concrete by the thin foam material designed to fill any wind or bug entry under a low spot. The 6" minimum clearance from the bottom of your siding to any dirt is to protect the siding from water damage and also encourage bugs to not try to enter. That really doesn't stop a determined bug/ant/spider but it does protect the siding by allowing water to drip off. If your having the ground around the house treated for termite protection some plants and shrubs won't like it for 6 months or more so planting now could be an expensive waste.
My strongest suggestion for the day concerns your HVAC..
If the ceiling sanding, wall muding and sanding, flooring fixing and other extremely dusty construction activities that need to be completed are done with your system running you will fill your register ducts, trunk lines, A-frame coil fins and blower fan cage with fine particulates some of which will circulate all over the house for months/years.
Take a look at the "prefilter" in your static charged system now. You will probably find that it is a very thin plastic screen/mesh that really doesn't stop stuff like plasterboard dust. The next line of defense, the static ring pins are not meant to stop anything, just to set up a charge. The last line of defense, the 3" thick electrically charged briefcase filters will stop a lot of stuff, but will clog rapidly from construction dust. Those two babies are very expensive to replace.
I imagine the data packet that came with the filter unit warns about shutting off the system during dusty construction but the boys are not going to shut off dry cool air during their time there, if not forced too.
I would shut off the system at the breaker box and remove the pull breakers on the inside air handler so they can't turn it back on by just flipping the breakers in the main box.
If the floor registers have been put in place, pick them out and put plastic wrap under them and reinsert. If not cover the holes with some scrap tile or something to keep dust from settling into the pipes.
The warning lights on the filter box are really not meaningful according to my Trane technicians. If the pre-filter red light comes on it is obviously long overdo to be washed. I wash mine in a big slop sink
in the basement and then blow the remaining water off with an air compressor.
The increasing string of LED lights for the briefcase filters is really just a timer according to my Trane guys. What mad scientist thinks he can determine the amount of dust in an environment based on time?:confused2:
I also blow the briefcase filters out with low pressure air outside the garage. It is amazing how much dust they accumulate. Blowing them out in the basement would just add more dust back into the environment.
Anyway, just a suggestion, to lock out the system during the remaining dusty construction. With dark tile floors and dark granite counter tops to easily show dust, your mom may ring your neck if you don't.:laughing:
Ron
