Our next LIVE Fix Construction workshop will be with the Greater Lehigh Valley CSI Chapter in Allentown, PA this coming Wednesday, October 18th, 2017 from  6pm to 9pm. 

We'll be hosted at the Holiday Inn Conference Center Lehigh Valley, PA, 7736 Adrienne Dr, Breinigsville, Pennsylvania.  The cost is $30 for CSI Members / $35 for Non-Members.  

Special rates for Young Professionals under the age of 35.  Email Jon Lattin for details. 

Please get more information here. 

Contributed by ​Roy F. Schauffele

I opened up my business in Texas on July 4, 1987 and have been in continuous operation since then. When I came to Texas about 65 to 70% of the leak issues I dealt with were roof related, now the vast majority of building envelope leaks that I handle are related to the walls and windows. There are a variety of reasons for these problems:
​

1. A very thin workforce and not always well-trained installation crew; most flashing installs are unintentionally done incorrectly.
2. Folks not realizing the absolute long-term cost of improper product selection (chemical incompatibility) or installation.
3. The failure of all involved to not recognize the changing chemical mixtures in today’s wall design.

We all need to realize that today’s walls are being designed for a 40+ year life span and we must adjust our thinking accordingly. Product warranties could be a good indicator of how long the product is anticipated to last. We must also realize that the total installed cost of a flashing system should be taken into serious consideration, and not just the cost of materials. The Brick Institute Association (BIA) has excellent Tech Notes 7 & 7A (Click for link) on this topic at www.gobrick.com/Technical-Notes. This is one of the reference resources I use.

Please remember that for through wall flashing to work properly, the flashing material/assembly must extend beyond the face of the mortar.

Today’s cavity walls are a chemical soup of ingredients:

1. Continuous Insulations: extruded and expanded polystyrene, foil faced polyisocyanurates, spray polyurethane foams and mineral wool.  Some of these materials require a wider cavity wall space to achieve the design effective R-value.
2. Air Barriers: acrylic, silicone, neoprene, polymer sheet goods, polymer modified asphalts and several others.
3. Windows: metal, PVC-coated metal, Kynar-coated (Wikipedia definition: Polyvinylidene fluoride, or polyvinylidene difluoride, (PVDF) is a highly non-reactive thermoplastic fluoropolymer produced by the polymerization of vinylidene difluoride), and others
4. Exterior Sheathing materials: plywood, OSB, foil faced board, gypsum boards
5. The chart immediately below is indicative of some of the chemical compatibility problems you could run into. The data is pulled from a variety of manufacturers web sites.
6. The question you need to ask of your suppliers is, “Is your recommended flashing compatible with XYZ cavity wall component?” and get a letter to that effect from each manufacturer that touches another? This is for the protection of both the architect and installer.

Contributed by Elias Saltz

I’ve been receiving a lot of positive feedback on the Misconception Series and I’m happy to continue writing it.  I want to especially thank Eric and Cherise for encouraging me to add more posts on more topics.  I hope that among all the other great things the LFC project is doing to fix construction, my little corner dedicated to dispelling misconceptions is helpful.  I’m especially grateful to the manufacturer’s technical reps who agree to participate and relate the common misconceptions and help fill in the correct information.
 
For those of you new to the misconception series, I encourage you to read the introductions to my two previous entries so you will know what it’s all about. (Editor's Note: Read post one on Gypsum Board here and Aluminum Framed Storefronts here) 

The reps I chose to approach for this post, Kim Shaw, along with her Technical Service Manager John Dalton of GCP Applied Technologies and Scott Baiker from Isolatek, are both active and involved CSI members that I’ve come to know well over my career.  I consider them my trusted advisors when it comes to questions about their companies’ lines of fireproofing products.  I’m not promoting their products over their competitors’ - it’s far more about the individual reps than the companies that they work for.

07 81 00 - Spray-Applied Fireproofing
​
Introduction to Fireproofing
 
Fireproofing, as covered by this specification section, typically refers to an application of a spray-applied fire-resistive material (SFRM) to steel structural framing or decking, which then greatly prolongs the time that the structure survives during a fire.  Unprotected steel is extremely vulnerable to heat. “Critical failure of steel occurs when the steel reaches 537°C (1,000°F). At this point, unprotected steel is reduced to 60% of its original strength, is prone to bend and deflect and the structural load stability and physical characteristics of steel is compromised (1).” However, it doesn’t need to be nearly that hot to cause catastrophic failure; it will begin to lose strength beginning when it reaches about 300°C (572°F).  Fireproofing works by insulating the steel, thereby delaying how quickly it heats up and increasing the duration that the structure will survive, allow occupants to escape, and gives emergency responders confidence that they have time to safely enter the building and fight the fire.