Got a wall situation I'm not familiar with... Tore out the old built-ins and wall around my fireplace. From outside to inside: The exterior wall is brick,then about a half inch gap, then there's a layer of weird old particle board sheathing, and touching that is the 2x4's of the inner wall, with some old black batt double faced (tar paper) wood pulp insulation. Here's my question: I'm going to tear out this old nasty insulation and replace it with something that hasnt been ate up by mice and fallen apart. Everything I read is contradictory as far as what type of insulation to use since the wall itself is brick... Like i said, there's a layer of what appears to be exterior sheathing between the insulation/studs and the brick wall itself. It's pretty garbage but it's there. I was leaning toward using some of the Roxul stuff since it's supposedly better with mold resistance etc. and allows moisture to travel through it, but it's been fine with double sided batts this whole time (50+ years)... plus I'd like to use something with at least a little vapor resistance for the summer. Here in IL. Since it has that sheathing layer can I treat is as a normal wall in those areas? Or does the brick still come into play? Planning on putting new insulation, then either drywall or wood panel and building new built-in bookshelves on that around the fireplace. Gonna frame in the fireplace separately and do a stone veneer, so basically I'm just looking at the walls on either side to insulate. All I know is this old black stuff has got to go...and I'd rather have something than nothing in that wall. Or there's always EPS? Not sure how that'd work adjacent to the sheathing though. Thanks guys. Pic

We have a fellow coming out tomorrow to look at our foundation. I don't think he is into Power Brace but I have read about this online and kind of like it BUT ... they basically erect steel beams to the joists and straighten your wall over time. Fortunately our wall is not that bad so this system may work for us. What I was wondering was .. does anyone have experience with this method? I see they tie into a floor joist ... why not run something across the bottom of the joists and tie into that? That way the pressure is spread out rather than on one joist every so many feet. I like the idea of not having to excavate outside but I wonder about pressure on just the one joist? Can someone make sense of this system to me? thanks