Do you have a spray foam project on your horizon? Whether your home, an addition, an attic, or a garage: Here is how to prepare your space!
As a professional spray foam team, we typically see clients who are either OVER prepared for our arrival, or the alternative, UNDER prepared.
It can be a challenge to know exactly what you, as the client, need to do before you have a spray foam team arrive on-site for a project… So we have created a to-do list for you!
What Do I Need To Do Before Spray Foam Is Installed?
1. Clean and dry!
Proper spray foam installation demands a clean AND dry surface to stick to. If spraying to wood, the moisture content needs to be under 16% or the foam won’t adhere properly.
2. All plumbing and electrical work is complete.
Spray foam insulation will completely cover and fill each and every place it is sprayed. The last thing you want is to have plumbing OR electrical that is incomplete or needs an update.
You do not need to have your light fixtures and outlets installed at this time.
In fact, we prefer the outlets and light fixtures are not installed to prevent overspray. Electrical boxes and wires, however, should be in place.
We also recommend placing rigid foam behind any electrical panels before spray foam insulation. This allows spray foam to be placed directly up against the rigid foam board, sealing everything in place.
For plumbing, it is important that all piping is in place before spray foam installation. Our team will tape off anywhere necessary so that you will be able to install fixtures later on in the construction process.
Sometimes, changes need to be made to electrical and plumbing after spray
foam is installed. It happens…
Here is a perfect example:
A sprinkler system needed to be installed after the spray foam was installed. The constructor simply cut out the foam to install the piping. After the piping was in place, our team came back to re-foam the area.
4. Any penetrations to the exterior need to be addressed.
Normally, this would fall under plumbing/electrical but we have seen enough people forget that it is worth noting on its own.
Some examples of penetrations would include bathroom, kitchen, and dryer vents.
When these are installed ahead of time, our team can foam around these penetrations to create an airtight seal and prevent leaks in the future.
The exception: It is important to remember that spray foam can’t go around most
chimneys because they are not rated for direct contact with combustibles.
For most chimneys, we need to stay 6” away.
4. All inside corners/ nailers for drywall need to be installed.
After the foam is installed, it can be difficult to install an insider corner that the framer missed.
So take some time to walk through your space and ensure corner nailers are in
place.
5. Remove necessary items, depending on what is being sprayed.
Before we talk further about removing items, let’s talk about the “why.”
A common question we hear is “Is Spray Foam messy?”
The answer is simple, YES! Thus, it is imperative to removal as much as you can from the room.
For a ceiling…
Remove EVERYTHING. This may sound obvious, but it can easily be
overlooked! Or the task is started and not thoroughly finished. It is common to
find chairs, pieces of furniture, or household items within the space that is going to be spray-foamed.
For walls or rim joists…
Move everything away from the walls, or area being sprayed by at minimum four
feet, although we’d prefer six feet. The more space we have to maneuver, the nicer of a job we can do!
After these five tasks are complete…
Take a deep breath! We’ll take the project from here.
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