What is the Building Envelope and why does it matter? How can it fail? What role does tape play in air sealing?
In this post, we demystify the building envelope, helping builders and contractors identify weak spots in building tightness in order to improve air sealing, and create more structures that are sustainable, cost-effective and comfortable in all conditions.
Everyone instinctively knows that when you go outside on a cold day, you must zip your coat to stay warm. It doesn’t matter how thick the coat is, if it’s left open, your body heat will leak out.
The same is true with building insulation — no matter its R-value (thermal performance), if insulation isn’t continuous throughout the building envelope like a zipped coat, heat will escape – wasting energy and money. Hence the term continuous insulation.
Bill Robinson is a nationally known construction trainer and presenter and owner of Train2Build and Train2Rebuild, a company that provides education for the building industry and homeowners. Headquartered in New…
Double-sided tape is any tape that is coated with adhesive on both sides. Designed to stick two surfaces together without being seen, these versatile tapes deliver neater-looking projects and better craftsmanship. And unlike screws or rivets – which join materials at a single point – high-strength double-sided tape permanently adheres one substrate to another while spreading the stress load.
Sounds great, right!? Yet, much like everything else on the job site, choosing the right double-sided tape for the specific application is not as easy as it sounds. Whether you’re bonding glass, wood, steel, concrete, foam, and/or plastic together, it’s important to understand the materials you are bonding. Concrete with a textured surface is going to require more adhesive strength than, say, carpet padding.
In this Field Guide to House Wrap & Seaming, we’ve gathered the most important installation and seaming tape tips to build quality, energy-efficient buildings.
We will cover building code best practices, how to install housewrap (the right way), how to prevent common house wrap problems, reasons why housewrap can still leak, and how seaming tape can make your building project airtight and moisture-proof.
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In just about every climate in which we live and build, the No. 1 job of any building enclosure is environmental separation.
Keeping water, air, and heat locked in or out of buildings can make them more resource-efficient, durable, and safer for occupants.
The greatest challenge in this endeavor is maintaining the continuity of our air barriers, drainage planes, and insulation layers, particularly at penetrations, transitions, and margins of building assemblies.
The answer?
High-performance seaming tape.
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