Had to rethink the way I was lifting the cellulose. I lift the bulk of it using a scoop I made out of an old piece of metal roofing, then use a shop vac paired to a trash can turned into a separator to lift the rest of it. I tried removing the foam sleeve from the shop vac, which made a huge difference to the suction, but found it was too powerful for its own good. As soon as I got even the slightest clog in the pipe the motor sucked the paper filter into the cage, allowing the fine dust to bypass the filter and blow straight through the motor. Not only is that bad for the motor, it's not great having fine dust blown into the air with any force. So I had to put the foam filter back. Maybe I'll go buy another one so I can wash one and use the other while it dries.
Now the vacuum setup is working fairly well again, albeit without the violent suction it had without the foam sleeve. I got another 70-odd gallons of cellulose lifted, and probably lost about 70 gallons of sweat while I was at it. I would have done more but it was really very warm up there. Before long I'll be in a place where I can pull down the ceiling below, then rope in a couple of friends who foolishly agreed to help me fit drywall. And then I'll have the first room rebuilt! Yay! Then I can focus my attention on the room below it, and that should be pretty easy. It needs a small amount of old lath and plaster pulled down, it will need a couple of new wall studs to be fitted and secured to the existing studs (the existing ones are supporting and slightly bowed), and hopefully then I can get that drywalled as well.
I'm going to need the external door replaced as well. It's a shame to replace the door that is there because it's part of the original house, but it's got so much glass in it that it needs a big ugly blind in front of it for privacy, and it really isn't designed for keeping noise out. When the house was built there was no road noise to speak of because there was no such thing as a truck. What I'll probably look to do is salvage as much of the wood as I can, and hopefully preserve the glass out of it too. I suspect a local crafter would be quite keen to get their hands on a huge piece of 100-year-old glass.
