Mineral wool vs fiberglass insulation | everything you need to know

Rock

wool

and glass

insulation

are two of the most commonly used types of

insulation

in residential construction. In this video we will see how they differ, as well as the pros and cons. Owens Corning and rock

wool

are the two most popular. Brands out there, this product is usually called

mineral

wool insulation, but actually both are

mineral

insulation, they are just made from different minerals, one is made from stone and rocks and the other is made from glass. Let's start with rock wool, its main ingredients. They are basalt rock slag, coke and recycled rock wool waste.

Basalt rock is the dark igneous rock that forms from the rapid cooling of molten lava slag. It is a byproduct of the smelting of metals such as iron, copper, lead and nickel when these metal minerals are heated to high temperatures. or slag are separated from the molten metal since it has been melted before it has a high melting efficiency. Coke is a gray, hard, porous fuel with a high carbon content and few impurities. It is obtained by heating coal or oil in the absence of air that is recycled. The waste is crushed into a fine powder and made into briquettes, basaltic rock slag and the briquettes are ground, washed and melted with coke at 1500 degrees Celsius or 2700 degrees Fahrenheit to form molten lava, the liquid is spun into fiber-like strands 15 to 20 micrometers thick a binder solution made of phenol urea formaldehyde resin is added to the fibers to help them adhere to each other oil is sprayed to improve water repellency tufts of rock wool are transported in a conveyor belt to a pendulum device the pendulum moves back and forth spraying the rock wool in layers onto another conveyor belt the rollers compress the layers to make them denser they are taken to a long oven and heated to cure the binders of resin blades and water jets cut rock wool in baths a marking tool burns the r value and company name on bats the most popular rock wool manufacturer is roxul or rock wool Comfort Bat is a semi-rigid product that It is used in side houses on the walls connected to the exterior.

Comfort board is a compressed rigid product used outside homes for safe and sound continuous insulation. It is used in interior partitions. Now let's look at how

fiberglass

or glass insulation is made. Its main ingredients are sand or silicon dioxide, sodium carbonate, limestone or calcium carbonate and crushed recycled glass called sodium carbonate which helps reduce the melting point of sand to save. The energy and limestone prevent the glass from dissolving in water. All ingredients are heated in a furnace to 1700 degrees Celsius or 3000 degrees Fahrenheit to produce sand or liquid glass. This is poured into rotating containers called fibrizers that have thousands of small holes.

Compressed air cools quickly. They travel down the molten glass creating short strands of glass fibers. They are naturally white or brown, but a pink polymer glue is sprayed on them which gives them the color we

know

. A conveyor belt takes these fibers to a 500-degree Fahrenheit oven that sets the glue. Circular saws cut the large sheets and an inkjet prints the manufacturer's details and the r-value in the bathrooms. In the last stage the bats are compacted and put into bags. The most popular

fiberglass

manufacturer is Owens, as their Ecotouch insulation is available in bath rolls and blown in loose fill, bats can be lined with craft paper to control moisture transmission or with an aluminum vapor retarder for walls connected to the exterior.

The manufacturing principles for both types of insulation are very similar although their ingredients are different, let's see. In some of the other differences between the two, six pieces of the 16-inch by 48-inch R30 rock wool insulation costs $61 at Lowe's, the equivalent 16-inch by 48-inch R30 fiberglass insulation costs $64 at Home Depot. , but contains 11 pieces of stone ball insulation. almost double the price of fiberglass, since rock wool is three times denser and is also heavier. A single piece of R30 rock wool weighs 6.6 pounds, while an equivalent piece of R30 fiberglass weighs 3 pounds. Both types of insulation work with the insulating property of air trapped between the fibers that is why it is recommended to fluff the insulation after removing it from the bag when the bats are compressed they lose trapped air and the r value is drastically reduced the loss of r value Over time it is called thermal drift rock wool or rock wool.

Rigid, if compressed, it simply bounces back to its original shape. It has greater dimensional stability and less thermal drift. Fiberglass, on the other hand, is spongy and does not maintain its shape either vertically on walls or horizontally in attics, so its thermal drift or loss of r value over time is significant, it is marketed as an r30 product, but that is not the real value. Rock wool's high density equals more trapped air and better sound absorption properties than fiberglass. I built these five acoustic panels using rock wool insulation that I purchased at Home Depot for 46, the total cost of each panel including the 1x4 wood studs, fabric, and staples was around twenty dollars.

Stone wall insulation is naturally hydrophobic or waterproof because it is made from basalt rock, the oils added to the fibers improve water repellency, on the other hand, fiberglass is not waterproof, it can absorb water and moisture , it compacts and loses all insulating properties. Moisture resistance means that stone wool does not promote rot, corrosion, fungus, mold or bacterial growth. Unlike fiberglass, rock wool is naturally fire resistant up to 2000 degrees Fahrenheit because it has a high melting point. If you live in a fire-prone area, it is recommended to use continuous insulation on the exterior of your home, such as a comfort board, to protect the structure of your building.

Fiberglass is not as fire resistant and will burn craft paper or foil. Foil coating will cause it to burn even faster. Both rock wool and fiberglass are quite easy to use. Rock wool can be cut with a serrated bread knife, while fiberglass can be cut with a utility knife. It is easier to install because the dense, firm bats frictionally fit into place and do not settle. It does not require stapling on both the walls and the ceiling, fiberglass, on the other hand, is flexible, so it must be secured with staples or wire. You should wear gloves, long-sleeved shirts, and a respirator when handling both materials if they touch your naked body.

Small fragments of rock or glass will become embedded in the skin and cause rashes. You should not inhale these fibers because they will become trapped in your lungs and windpipe and cause long-term breathing problems once they are installed and hidden behind a covering. or drywall there is no health risk there are some associations that claim that mineral wool is as bad as asbestos and that the phenolic resin used in it is toxic even though tests show that it is not these people do not present enough evidence to support their claims, marketing their recycled content is very complicated.

Good quality rock wool is made from basalt rock with 25 to 30 percent recycled content. There are other slag wool insulation brands that claim their products have 90 percent slag wool insulation with recycled content. It is an inferior product to basalt rock insulation but they market it as mineral wool to fool you, so be careful with that fiberglass insulation, on the other hand it has about 30 recycled contents, mainly old windows that are crushed. Both products are marketed as environmentally friendly because they do not contain CFCs or chlorofluorocarbons or gas. Both are also technically recyclable if clean. You cannot recycle insulation from older homes that are full of dust, moisture, mold, microorganisms and other dangerous substances.

Rock wool is not. so popular, so there are fewer varieties of the product, for example, blown loose fill insulation is hard to find, fiberglass is extremely popular, so there are a lot of different products on the market, they don't have any outer product, although vapor permeability is the capacity. To allow the movement of water vapor molecules through the material, I will do another video that goes into more depth on permeability and permeability classification, but rock wool is vapor permeable if used as continuous exterior insulation, it allows its facade breathe and dry. Fiberglass is too. vapor permeable, but you have to be careful with the orientation of the aluminum foil or paper-faced bats, they should face inward in cold weather and outward in hot weather.

It is quite obvious that rock wool is a superior product to glass wool. I'm surprised humans thought of that. turning rocks or stones and glass into this cotton candy that looks like fluffy insulation, they seem like the least likely candidates, but they work very well. I try to cover every topic I can think of, but if I missed anything, please leave me a message below and leave me a comment. If there are other topics that interest you, I hope you enjoyed the video, don't forget to hit the like button and subscribe to my channel, thanks for watching, see you around.