Weber Leca® Insulation Fill Does Eight Weeks Work In Just One Hour For Helena Homes

The renovation of 60 bungalows being carried out by Helena Homes in St Helens, Lancashire, requires very substantial voids below the floors to be filled.  Traditionally this would take four men at least two weeks to haul and compact hardcore in place. By using Weber Leca® Insulation Fill, which on this rare occasion has been blown into place loose through a flexible pipe, the void is filled in just one hour, saving nearly £6,000 in labour costs per property. Weber Leca® Insulation Fill usually arrives in 50 litre bags which are laid direct into the void still within the bag!

Weber Leca® Insulation Fill is a lightweight clay material formed by heating and firing natural glacial clays which transforms it into various sized lightweight ceramic granules.  These granules have a hard ceramic shell and are treated to stop them absorbing moisture. In this form the material has first class insulation properties. The high volume by weight is ideal for most infill operations.

The properties in St Helens, constructed in the 1950’s, were built on poor, uneven and unstable ground. Substantial digging had to be undertaken at the time of construction to enable foundations to be laid as well as equally substantial brick foundations until stable ground was achieved. The old style timber joists and floorboards were therefore laid across voids up to two metres deep in some places.

Over time these timbers have rotted and the renovation project has had to remedy the void to enable insulated solid floors to be created. Traditional hardcore fill would have had to be barrowed into place as access is restricted. Four men would have been employed for two weeks on each property to fill these voids prior to the concrete floor being laid.

The Weber Leca® Insulation Fill was brought to the site in a 55m³ load on a truck with blower system which pneumatically delivers the lightweight fill. One operator controls the flow from the delivery pipe and another rakes the insulation fill into position. The loose aggregate is poured in 500mm deep layers and a vibrating plate compactor is run over the fill to firm it into position. In just 60 minutes the Weber Leca® Insulation Fill has filled the deepest voids; lesser voids in this project have taken no more than 15 minutes to fill.  A 1200 gauge polythene membrane is then applied to the filled void before a steel mesh is installed in preparation for the pumped concrete.

Dave Williams, site project manager for Helena Partnership, says: “We have saved thousands of pounds just in labour costs by using Weber Leca® Insulation Fill. It is quick, clean and easily handled. It provides great insulation - we just put a damp proof membrane over the Weber Leca® Insulation Fill and lay the concrete. The whole renovation job now takes just a few days so the householder is less inconvenienced and doesn’t have to move out of the property for the two or three weeks that it would take if we had used traditional methods.”

Dave continues: “I’ll never again use another piece of rubble to fill a void. Weber Leca® Insulation Fill has proved a brilliant solution for us.”

More information about Weber Leca® Insulation Fill is available on www.netweber.co.uk or call 01525 722170 for technical support and advice.