The Spray Foam business is hard, and harsh winter weather makes it much harder. This is especially true in the far north, but a sudden drop in temperature can cause significant problems that affect your bottom line even in mild and warm environments.
Everything is more difficult in the Winter; the logistics of getting your foam sets to your shop, warming and prepping your chemicals, getting the rig to the Jobsite, setting-up the Jobsite, and lastly, prepping the substrate to spray. A savvy contractor will plan, prepare, and compensate for difficult winter conditions to keep the crews working as efficiently as possible.
The most important changes required to maintain profitability in the Winter are:
Generally speaking, trucking companies do a pretty great job of getting our chemical from the factory or warehouse to your shop. Still, a weather event can stop or slow traffic making on-time delivery impossible. Weather delays might not be only in your region, trucks could be held-up hundreds of miles from you, and there’s simply nothing you can do about it. Ordering a few days to a couple of weeks in advance can mean the difference between your jobs getting done, and you get paid or not.
Heat makes everything easier. Chemicals flow, foam sticks, yields remain acceptable, and your crew will appreciate being warm. Store your sets in a warm room at your shop. This could be an insulated shipping container or a dedicated, warm room in your warehouse. Spray foam in the walls and ceiling, store your drums on pallets with fans to blow the heated air throughout and under your drums to get them warm and keep them warm. This can save hours on every job since the crew won’t have to warm the chemical enough to get it to spray. The primary heaters on your proportioner can only raise the temperature so much, and hose heat is less effective in the Winter, so start with a warm chemical every day. You’ll be glad you did, and so will your crew.
The heated chemical and a rig prepped and ready to spray solves half the winter challenge. The other half is heating the substrate you’re spraying. It’s important to apply heat without adding moisture to the structure, which can condense and cause even more delays. This means you’ll need indirect propane or a diesel-fired heater. With an indirect heater, the temperature of combustion is exchanged to the air in the building across a heat exchanger, and the flue gas stays outside. The flue gas’s moisture does not go into the building, so it can’t condense on your substrate. It’s necessary to use dehumidifiers and heat in some regions to dry the framing members below 19% moisture content. Heating the building the day before spraying is often the only way to heat the substrate deeply enough to make the foam stick and so it doesn’t shrink or crack.
If you’re not familiar with indirect-fired heaters, ask your tech rep about them. Fast and thorough heating can make or break your profit on the job. Even if you had to spend $75 on fuel, operating in a warm environment and spraying warm surfaces can save hundreds or thousands of dollars and every dollar saved goes straight to your bottom line.
Similar to the warm room and heating the structure, keeping the rig warm pays big dividends. Mechanical equipment starts and runs better, chemical flows, and the crew members prepping the rig can move more quickly through their job site set-up checklist. Attitudes improve as well as your profit!
Beware of metal buildings in the Winter. They can be nothing but trouble, especially for SPF. Metal does not allow any absorption into the substrate as OSB and plywood do. The small amount of absorption and attenuation common with wood substrates makes adhesion far more reliable than spraying on metal sheathing, and cold metal is the worst case for spray foam.
One technique for spraying metal is to “prime” the sheathing with a thin coat of foam. Some call this a “flash coat,” and many manufacturers do not approve of this practice. ArmorThane does recommend it with their foams, so be sure to ask your ArmorThane tech rep for guidance on how to do this effectively. Another essential winter practice is to get closer with your spray gun and use a smaller tip.
If your foam is slow to react, sags on vertical surfaces, or drips when sprayed overhead, then it’s too cold. You might have all the right settings on the proportioner, but it’s still too cold, probably due to a lack of adequate hose heat. Make sure your hose is well insulated, especially around the Fluid Temperature Sensor (FTS), and lift your hose off the ground, when it’s cold, wet, or covered with snow. The hose can be supported by small bags of scrap foam or foam blocks made for this purpose. The hose will conduct heat to the ground or snow many times faster than to the air, so get it off the ground. Automatic hose heat control is very important. Yes, there is a by-pass method on most rigs to set specific amps if the FTS or sensor circuitry fails, but this is intended to be used only to get you through the day until you can repair the problem, not as a permanent operating procedure.
Some sweet spots have become industry standards in the spectrum of polyurethane spray foam densities. About ½ pound per cubic foot of open-cell foam is a sweet spot for low density, R-Value, yield, and sprayability. Two-pounds per cubic foot density are ideal closed-cell or medium-density foam based on R-Value, yield, sprayability, and dimensional stability. Less than 2-pound closed-cell foams might have a slightly higher yield, but they tend to lose dimensional stability in cold weather applications and curiously don’t necessarily lose adhesion. This becomes difficult when the foam shrinks and cracks but remains tenaciously adhered to the substrate, making it extremely challenging to remove to correct the defect.
Simply put, there are three primary solutions to cold foam problems: add heat, add heat, and add heat. Add heat to the chemical in storage and transportation, properly functioning primary heaters, and temperature-controlled hose heat. Add heat to the substrate. Call your cold-weather expert for advice. ArmorThanetech reps have years of experience with cold weather spraying, and they can help maximize your crew’s productivity.
If you’ve chosen a proven formula like ArmorFoam 2.0®, you should be able to spray most days of the Winter as long as you heat your chemical, your rig, as well, as the substrate.
To protect your profit, stick to true 2-pound foams designed for winter application, such as ArmorFoam® Winter Formula.
The performance was judged for dimensional stability and R-Value retention through -40°F winter weather and ArmorFoam® passed with flying colors! ArmorFoam® Winter is a cold-weather foam you can trust from a company you can trust. Call ArmorThane to learn more about heating-up your winter profits.
One commonality that runs across all coating project types and substrates is the importance of surface preparation. According to the coatings manufacturer ArmorThane, up to 80 percent of all coating failures can be attributed to poor surface preparation, affecting coating adhesion. Inadequately prepared surfaces often result in decreased coating integrity and service life. The exemplary method of surface preparation depends on understanding and adapting to the substrate, the environment, and the coating system’s expected life.
“The more significant the job and the more ramifications of something failing, the more scrutiny that gets put on it,” said Garry Froese, CEO of ArmorThane.
While surface preparation is often seen as one aspect of a broader coatings application project, there can be many steps just within that one phase. Factors to consider include safety protocols, climate control, and pressure washing, to name a few.
Before beginning any physical surface preparation work, contractors should take time to form a suitable plan for all job site safety specifications, both for workers and the surrounding areas. Given recently heightened regulations from the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), this step has only become more significant entering the 2020s.
Ideally, many potential dangers could be engineered out of a project. But for the construction industry, where most jobs are completed directly at the Jobsite, this may not be feasible. This leads to a priority on PPE, with a customized strategy for each job site.
It necessitates a comprehensive risk assessment that considers the different types of exposure, including physical hazards such as drops from heights, slips, trips, falls, cuts and abrasions, chemical exposures, exposure to hazardous particles liquids, etc.
Within PPE for surface preparation, type-CE supplied-air respirators approved by the U.S. National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) are often essential. Other needs are often blasted hoods, gloves, eye and ear protection, coveralls, hard hats, and boots. Depending on the Jobsite location, fall protection from providers such as 3M and Guardian Fall Protection may be required.
Though water is often used to clean a substrate, too much of it can produce its own set of problems. For instance, if a contractor deals with a leaky roof, adding water may not be the answer. In that circumstance, equipment such as leaf blowers and shovels may make more sense. With concrete slabs, excessive water can lead to poor adhesion and premature coating failures.
Wagner Meters and Tramex Meters are among products’ providers to test moisture levels in both industrial and commercial settings — including in situ relative humidity (RH) testing. For that objective, Wagner’s new C555 Concrete Moisture Meter is among the company’s latest developments. The C555 emits an electromagnetic wave to measure moisture down to 0.75 inches (1.9 cm) below the surface. When combined with an ASTM-compliant in situ concrete RH testing system, the C555 is a novel targeting system that helps contractors place probes in areas where they are most effective.
For roofs, contractors should be prepared to remove and replace all water-damaged areas before applying new roof coatings or coated spray polyurethane foam (SPF) systems. The Tramex Dec Scanner is one example of a mobile, nondestructive impedance scanner designed to survey moisture conditions in roofing and waterproofing systems instantly.
Once the climate is under control, one standard surface preparation method is to use a pressure washer, which cleans the substrate by eliminating old coatings and contaminants. Pressure washers can be used on concrete, steel, and roof substrates, with options including cold- and hot-water e and pressures up to ultrahigh-pressure water jetting.
The selection of pressure washers often depends on the unique needs of each job site. For example, while cold-water pressure washers are becoming for handling basic tasks such as removing dirt and mud, projects involving more complex contaminants — such as grease and grime — may require hot-water models. While the gallons per minute (GPM) and pounds per square inch (psi) of each machine’s pressure must be powerful enough to clean the substrate, excessive pressure can cause its own set of problems by destroying the surface. Thus, contractors have a careful balance to find when selecting tools, and they should pay close attention to the manufacturer’s specifications for the selected coating method. Mi-T-M recommends combining its CBA Aluminum Series cold-water pressure washer with a 20-inch rotary surface cleaner. The surface cleaner is described as an ideal accessory for cleaning flat surfaces. It has strong-bristled brushes for easy glide control, a heavy-duty aluminum handle, and a high-pressure trigger gun for efficient cleaning.
The variety of options possible across all these niche areas directly mirrors how important surface preparation is. By coupling that innovative approach with attention to detail on surface preparation, contractors should be able to blast themselves into success in 2021 and the new decade ahead.
A frequent question from homeowners researching spray foam insulation is “How much does spray foam insulation cost?” Much like buying a car, variable factors can influence the ultimate cost per square foot of a spray foam insulation installation. Below are four things to keep in mind about the cost of spray foam insulation.
Spray Foam Type: What kind of spray foam is being used? Does the project require closed-cell insulation or an open-cell spray foam insulation be used? Open-cell spray foam insulation is more cost-effective than closed-cell and is effective in residential projects in providing thermal comfort, air-sealing, and moisture management.
Quantity: How much material will be needed to complete the job? Open-cell spray can cover more surface area than closed cell spray foam insulation. This is due to the soft, sponge-like surface that expands up to 100 times its initial volume while closed-cell can expand between 40 and 60 times its initial size when applied, meaning more material is required to cover the space. The necessary thickness of the material, dictated by the building code or area of the home, will also contribute to how much material is needed.
Labor: Remember to factor in the price of the spray foam contractor’s labor cost. Unlike painting, spray foam insulation is not a DIY project, and it requires a certified professional to apply the material.
Location/Climate: Southern climates are different from northern climates. Closed-cell spray foam is typically used in areas prone to flooding (since FEMA recognizes the closed-cell as a flood-resistant material). At the same time, open-cell is a great option for southern climates due to its ability to breathe.
Contact:
To find out how much it will cost to install spray foam insulation, the spray foam licensed professionals at ArmorThane would be happy to give you a free estimate for your upcoming project!
Spray foam insulation can crank up the performance of your homes—if you do it right. Check out our daily posts on the Foam Insulation and the Foam Insulation Market. We review each company and relay the information directly to you. Join our mailing list and have them sent directly to your email each and every day.
If you would like to know more about polyurea or spray foam, we recommend visiting ArmorThane
