Those who decided to equip a living space in the attic or decided to change the roofing material are interested in the question: how to choose a roof insulation. Manufacturers offer several varieties and types of this material. Our article will help to understand this diversity.
The word "roof" for many people is associated with warmth, reliability and comfort.
For this reason it is necessary to choose heaters for a roof very responsibly. Some may say: “Why insulate and so it’s normal” and they will be wrong. Known fact: warm air rises.
After that, they either escape into the atmosphere through the cold roof, or linger indoors.Therefore, if your roof is not insulated, you have to spend more gas or electricity to heat your house, which you will agree is not only not economical, but simply unreasonable.
Of course, the material for roof insulation will not be able to heat it, it will simply delay the flow of warm air inside the room (attic).
Attic roofs are divided into two types:
- Residential.
- Non-residential.
What is the difference in their insulation? In residential attic spaces, not only roof slopes are insulated, but also part of the ceiling and side walls.
In non-residential - only floors separating the attic and the house. Naturally, the thickness of the insulation will also be different.
Also, do not forget that not only pitched roofs are insulated, but also flat ones. We will touch on insulation technologies below, now we propose to discuss the criteria by which insulation should be chosen.
Advice! Before buying a heater, it is advisable to familiarize yourself with the information about the materials and manufacturers. To study the characteristics of a particular heat insulator. It is also worthwhile to pre-calculate the required volume, so as not to take too much.
Principles for choosing a heater
Of course, the choice of material will depend primarily on the type of roof (flat, pitched), otherwise the criteria are the same.
There are only eight of them:
- Life time. High-quality insulation should retain its thermal insulation properties for a long time.
- Specific gravity. The material should not be too heavy, otherwise it will lead to a weighting of the entire structure, which is fraught with unpredictable consequences. This is affected by the density of the insulation for the roof. It is measured in kg/m3.
- Form stability.When buying, you should pay attention not only to the price and manufacturer, but also to the technical characteristics. In particular, for how long the insulation is able to maintain its geometric parameters. The reliability of the material will depend on this.
- Flammability. You should choose heaters made of non-combustible or self-extinguishing materials.
- Frost resistance. This is not an unimportant factor when choosing a heater, especially for the northern regions.
- Humidity. For some materials, with increasing humidity, thermal conductivity increases and they retain heat worse, which, of course, is not very good.
- Soundproofing. If the roof is covered with corrugated board or other noisy material, care should be taken that the selected insulation absorbs sounds and noises well, that is, it has soundproofing properties.
- Environmental friendliness. The selected insulation must be non-toxic, environmentally friendly, and odorless.
Also, the thickness of the insulation will play an important role when insulating the roof. Calculate it according to the formula. But first, it will be necessary to refer to the rules of SNiP 23.02.2003 "Thermal protection of buildings".
It determines the required thermal resistance of building structures (Rtr.). For each region and type of roof there will be a coefficient. Knowing it and the thermal conductivity of the material, you can calculate the thickness of the insulation.
We get the thickness of the insulation in meters.
So how can you insulate the roof? Roofing insulation is of several types:
- Expanded polystyrene foam. This is a lightweight gas-filled material that belongs to the class of foam plastics. It is used for insulation of all types of roofs, but more often for flat roofs. Service life is about 50 years.It is light in weight and is considered more effective than mineral wool.
- Polyurethane foam. Used to insulate roofs and attics. Belong to the group of gas-filled plastics. It has low thermal conductivity, light weight, high waterproofing characteristics and low vapor permeability, and also has a long service life.
- Stone wool. Plates made of mineral wool. The roofing material has a high heat-saving ability, non-combustible, has low moisture absorption, resistant to rodents and microorganisms.
- Glass wool. Variety of mineral wool. This material is made from glass waste. It has good thermal insulation characteristics.
Most often preference is given to stone slabs. They are used for both pitched and flat roofs. Speaking of manufacturers, I would like to touch on two in more detail: Rockwool and Knauf.
Rockwool
The Danish insulation "Rockwool" has been the leader in sales in Russia over the past years. They have three directions, but we are interested in insulation for a flat roof.
These are mineral wool slabs based on basalt rocks. They are used for thermal insulation in flat roofs, single and multi-layer structures.
It is possible to use this material for roofing without cement screeds. But do not think that any roof material of this brand. There are both universal plates and specialized ones.
For example:
- Rockwool Ruf Butts have the letter designations H - for the bottom layer, B - for the top layer, without letters it is universal.
- Rockwool Cut-to-falls Roof Slab and Rockwool Underlay Roof Slab are used as the bottom layer in sandwich constructions.
Advice! If there are places where the required roof pitch is not available, Cut-to-falls Roof Slab is recommended.
- Rockwool TF-Board is used in single-layer constructions or as a top layer in multi-layer roofs. It can also be used as insulation against condensate in corrugated roofs.
- Hardrock 50/100/120/180 - plates of various thicknesses are used for thermal insulation of single-layer roofs or as a top ball. They are made of waterproof and water-repellent material.
The products of this company have good technical characteristics, are easy to install, have a long service life, the linear expansion and shrinkage coefficients are zero.
Knauf
Knauf thermal insulation materials have long been popular all over the world. Their operations are located in more than 100 countries in Europe, Asia and North America. The company produces insulation for pitched roofs, walls, floors and facades of buildings.
Glass wool is a thermal insulation made on the basis of fiberglass, which gives the material increased elasticity and provides a snug fit of the insulation to the walls.
This Knauf product ensures that steam can pass through it unhindered while maintaining optimal indoor climate conditions.
Basalt wool is a fibrous material obtained from metallurgical slags and their mixtures, as well as from silicate melts of rocks.
The roof insulation has good thermal and sound insulation, as well as refractory properties.
Products are produced in rolls and plates.All products of this manufacturer have excellent technical characteristics, have a long service life, are easy to install and environmentally friendly.
As already mentioned, the choice of heaters must be approached responsibly, you should use thermal insulation, which is designed specifically for your type of roof.
All factors should be taken into account (type and type of roof, region, roofing material used, etc.), but one should not forget that insulating a pitched or flat roof is a series of activities and simply laying thermal insulation is not enough.
There are special technologies for insulation. Of course, it is better to take care of this initially (during the construction of the house), but if it was not possible to do this right away, you can do the insulation later.
How to do it? Information can be found on the Internet. If the descriptions are not clear, you can watch the video. The main thing is the desire to do the work yourself and the material opportunity to carry it out.
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