Modern technologies make it possible to turn any home into a cozy and comfortable place to live. Provided that the correct insulation material is selected, this is not difficult to do. At the same time, insulation allows you to save on heating. The estimated thickness of thermal insulation depends on the climatic conditions in the area and a number of other factors.
Types and types of heaters
The following heat-shielding materials are traditionally used to insulate the walls of residential buildings:
- Styrofoam;
- material under the brand name "Penoplex";
- mineral wool or its ecological analogue;
- polyurethane foam in liquid or solid form;
- plaster and similar finishing compounds.
The market of modern building materials is saturated with a large number of varieties of insulation structures. Some of them are suitable exclusively for wooden structures, while others allow you to get the desired effect only when laying under concrete.
The most popular wall insulation is mineral basalt wool. The features of this material include:
- attractive thermal insulation characteristics;
- good sound insulation;
- fire protection;
- high strength indicators.
The disadvantages of cotton wool mats are considered high hygroscopicity, which makes it necessary to protect its surface with a layer of polyethylene film. The same category includes glass wool, which guarantees approximately the same performance, but at a lower price. Its disadvantage is the harmfulness of glass dust to human health and the need to take measures to protect the skin and respiratory organs.
Foam plates are also a good base for wall insulation (modifications of this material include styrene and extruded polystyrene foam). All of them have good thermal insulation properties, while providing a good level of sound insulation at the same time. Their disadvantages include fragility and susceptibility to deformation.
Liquid polyurethane foam is mounted on the surface to be protected by spraying, and solid workpieces are fixed on the walls by means of special adhesives. This type of insulation belongs to the category of modern and relatively expensive materials.
Parameters taken into account when choosing the type of heat insulator
Regardless of what material is chosen by the user as the main one, it is important to correctly determine the thickness of the insulation for the walls. Subject to complete certainty with the material used in construction (brick, timber or concrete), the choice of thermal insulation depends on the location of the building on the map of the country's regions. For wooden houses erected according to the same project in the Moscow region and in the Khabarovsk Territory, for example, the thickness of the insulation for walls made of cotton wool will differ significantly.
To take into account the factors affecting the choice of the thickness of the thermal insulation material, you will need to familiarize yourself with the current regulations (SNiP 23-02-2003 "Thermal protection of buildings"). Together with him, the Appendix No. 23-01-99 "Climatology" is considered. The first regulatory document gives the value of the thermal conductivity parameter for the building envelope (R0).The second of them will be required to identify the duration of the heating season in a specific region of the country.
The concept under consideration also defines such important parameters as:
- physical thermal insulation properties of the materials used;
- load capacity of the protective layer (resistance to deformation);
- features of installation at a specific facility;
- noise protection (sound insulation quality).
For any heat insulator, the following rule applies: the smaller its thickness and corresponding weight, the more convenient it is during installation. But when this indicator reaches a certain minimum, the insulation loses its functional qualities. When choosing it, the fact of the influence of the thickness of the material on the weight and other parameters is always taken into account.
Calculation of the thickness of the insulation for the walls
To calculate the desired indicator, it will be necessary to take into account the thermal resistance or thermal conductivity of the walls of insulated buildings in the form of the sum of the corresponding parameters of all, without exception, layers of the structure, including load-bearing ones. Based on this, the thickness of the thermal insulation depends on the characteristics of the material from which its walls are made. For brick and concrete structures, more insulation will be required, and for wooden and foam block buildings, slightly less.
It is possible to calculate the exact value of this indicator only if the climate at the construction site, the thermal conductivity of the material and the characteristics of the supporting structures are known. The thinner they are, the more the thickness of the insulation is chosen.
Brick walls
The calculation procedure for bricks and other materials is easiest to implement using online calculators, in large quantities presented on the Internet. In the calculations carried out for brick buildings, the value of the thermal conductivity of the material (0.6-0.95 W / meter K) is substituted into the proposed form. The adjacent column indicates the location of the building to be insulated. Many calculation services include density in the controlled parameters, for brick materials it is 1550-1900 kg / cubic meter.
Based on foam blocks
Similar calculations are carried out for buildings erected on the basis of lightweight foam blocks, widely used in private and industrial construction. To obtain the desired indicator, the same calculator is taken, in the columns of which the corresponding parameters are entered. In this case, their values will be represented by the following numbers:
- thermal conductivity - 0.14-0.38 W / m K;
- density - 400-1200 kg / cubic meter.
After entering these numbers into the corresponding windows and indicating the area, it is possible to obtain the required value for insulation for foam blocks.
Frame house
For a frame house, mineral (basalt) wool is considered an ideal insulation. When using it, the calculation of the thickness of the protective layer is reduced to the substitution of the thermal conductivity value of common types of wood (0.14-0.17 W / m K) and the figure corresponding to its density into the calculator column. The admissible values of the latter are 450-600 kg / cubic meter. After specifying the area where the house is being built, the required result is found.
Features of planning and design
Features of planning work on wall insulation are that they are allowed to be carried out inside and outside the building. Double-sided or multilayer insulation is used only in exceptional cases (in regions with a very harsh climate, for example). Another reason for choosing this option is the individual preferences of the owner of the house or the design features of the building.
The disadvantages of internal insulation include a decrease in the living area of the room, as well as the possibility of dew points on the border of two environments (between the wall and the insulation). Its positive aspects are:
- convenience of construction work;
- independence from weather conditions;
- the ability to leave the facades of the building unchanged.
With internal insulation, you will need reliable protection against vapor vapors in the form of a layer of polyethylene film. With the external arrangement of thermal insulation elements, the internal spaces remain unchanged and there is no need to use vapor barrier protection. At the same time, there is no need to rely on the old cladding of the building - it will have to be dismantled.
Wall cake composition
Before insulating the wall of a house or attic, you will need to competently form layers of a protective cake, which is a structure of sequentially laid materials that provide the required level of insulation. The main ingredients of such a pie are:
- frame made of beams with a typical size of 15x15 cm;
- horizontal type wooden lathing or metal profile;
- a layer of insulation based on mineral wool (expanded polystyrene);
- a special universal membrane that protects the structure from the wind and is a vapor barrier;
- vertically stuffed crate;
- internal wall cladding (drywall or lining);
- covering made of finishing material.
For the manufacture of wooden pie elements, you will need high-quality wood, dried in a natural way - in the open air under a canopy. Subject to all these conditions, the walls insulated with high-quality materials will serve the owners for many years.
