Fallis Construction, designer and manufacturer of high quality, low energy homes in Ireland, has built the first SpaceStud super insulated house in a contract worth £210,000. The 2,600ft2 Drumbane II House in Kesh, Co Fermanagh, which is completed externally and awaiting fitting out and finishing, features ITW Industry’s Alpine SpaceStud wall system as part of the high thermal performance exterior wall.
"We chose to use SpaceStud for its low percentage of timber, while providing a large void for the cellulose insulation," said Patrick Fallis, the construction company owner.
"The SpaceStud system creates a thermally broken timber frame which is a very important aspect when designing and building to the passive house standard."
The SpaceStuds were fabricated by Fallis Construction on a simple 10 tonne press. Upon arriving on site, the SpaceStuds were erected, clad and insulated. From inside to outside, the wall construction comprises 12.5mm Fermacell plasterboard, 50mm service void insulated with 50mm Rockwool Flexi, 15mm OSB for racking restraint and airtightness, 258mm SpaceStud with Warmcell 500 cellulose insulation pumped between, 80mm Gutex ThermoWall board and finished with silicone render to the exterior.
Alpine SpaceJoist open-web joists provide ample service voids within the floor to accommodate ducting for the necessary mechanical ventilation and heat recovery system.
With the SpaceJoist floor and SpaceStud exterior wall U-values calculated at 0.11W/m2K, the super insulated house is expected to comply with the Passive house/AECB Gold Standard with just 0.6 air changes per hour.
Following its experience on this project, Fallis Construction is keen to develop SpaceStud into an offsite manufactured pre-insulated sealed panel system for future projects.
