Browse Forums Building A New House 1 Nov 25, 2018 1:25 pm Hi homeone community, I am new here but have been studying the importance of thermally efficient building materials. What has surprised me is that there is still a lot of ignorance about R Values and how a highly thermally efficient home can save many thousands of dollars over the life of a a home. There is also some significant lack of understanding about the performance of building materials and problems that can be associated with traditional insulation materials. Most people building or having a house built know some basic things things about Thermal Efficiency as there is a requirement by the NCC to achieve a 6 Star Energy rating. Having said that there is not a lot of understanding of how this is achieved. A post that I saw on this forum (which is what has prompted me to join) was talking about an AAC panel having a high R Value. AAC does not have a high R Value. A 75mm panel has a R0.5 R Value of Hebel. It is the system including wall insulation that achieves the R Values. So if we understand that the thermal performance is made up of a number of elements, it is important to understand the durability of these elements. Standard insulation does have durability issues. Many houses over a number of years suffer a reduction in the thermal resistance of the building products protecting their home due to the deterioration of standard insulation. If you have gone up into a roof cavity, it is likely that you will have seen that the insulation batts used have collapsed and started deteriorating. This is more so with walls where the vertical gravitational load has a quicker failure rate that ceilings. A number of studies have been conducted with Expanded PolyStyrene (EPS) including this long term study undertaken by the Chief and Senior Engineer of the Soil Mechanics Division, Road Technology Department, Norwegian Public Road Department, where EPS was used as a filler and the tests were conducted on EPS for 24 years.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/268003956_LONG_TERM_PERFORMANCE_AND_DURABILITY_OF_EPS_AS_A_LIGHTWEIGHT_FILLING_MATERIAL A product we designed called StructaClad Lite has drawn on the features of EPS and enhanced its application by making it stronger on the external face by laminating a 12mm Sorrel Cement board as the outside skin and joining the panels with a biscuit to ensure there is no cracking at the joints. StructaClad Lite - The Thermal Wrap for your home. Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ Like ⋅ Add a comment ⋅ Pin to Ideaboard ⋅ This is post is not designed to sell our products, but it is designed to ensure that people who are building have a good understanding of Thermal Efficiency and how to evaluate different building materials when choosing what is the right substrate for their home. I hope to become an ongoing contributor to this site and to share with the various contributors some of the incredible opportunities there is with some of the latest building materials in the market. Kind Regards John That's a fantastic result! Happy you got it sorted out. cheers Simeon 6 8640 in the stormwater pit or the drain? Those dont look like theyd fit in the drain. Separately, the pits do get stuff in them during the course of the build. For the most… 1 7933 |