REPORT

Milestone 1.2

Principles of good practice to design the joints against thermal losses

Publisher:

Felicitas Warmuth
Jörg Lange
Lars Heselius

Task 1.1 Thermal loss in joints

This report includes 5 pages.

Date of issue: March 23th, 2010

 Project co-funded under the European Commission Seventh Research and Technology
Development Framework programme (2007-2013)
Theme 4 NMP – Nanotechnologies, materials and new production technologies
Prepared by
Felicitas Warmuth, Jörg Lange, Lars Heselius

Drafting history
Draft version 1 18.02.2010
Draft version 2 15.03.2010
Draft version 3
Draft version 4
Final 23.03.2010

Dissemination Level
PU Public X
PP Restricted on the other programme participants (including
the Commission Services)
RE Restricted to a group specified by the Consortium (including
the Commission Services)
CO Confidential, only for members of the Consortium (including
the Commission Services)

Verification and approval

Coordinator
Industrial Project Leader
Management Committee
Industrial Committee

Deliverable
D1.2 Design guidelines for good panel joints and joints sealing openings Due date:
focussing on air and water tightness Month 24
Completed:
Month
 Principles of good practice to design the joints against thermal losses

1. General

In the design of modern buildings, the thermal insulation plays an important role. One central
point for the thermal insulation and the energy saving is the air tightness of the envelope. Due
to the impervious metal sheets and the insulating core in between the sandwich technology
allows constructing very tight buildings. Compared to other building techniques like masonry
or concrete structures, sandwich facades have quite a lot of joints. To ensure the tightness,
special attention has to be paid to them. Due to the current European and national standards,
joints in the building envelope have to be sealed airtight permanently. The air tightness of
sandwich constructions can be determined according to EN 12114 [1]. The majority of
literature says “airtight according to the state of the art”. In the German standard DIN 4108-2
[2] the state of the art is defined by a coefficient for the air permeability of joints. The limit
value for a joints is 0.1 m³/[m*h*(daPa2/3)]. The same value can be found in DIN 18542,
which defines requirements for sealing tapes.
Tightness tests within EASIE WP1 showed that modern sandwich panel joints have usually
no problems to go below this limit value. In figure 1, some test results and the limit value in
DIN 4108-2 are demonstrated.

10

1 a-value DIN 4108-2

air permeability in m³/(hm)

Producer A, 100 mm
Producer B, 60 mm

0,1 Producer B, 100 mm

Producer C, 60 mm
Producer D, 60 mm
Producer D, 120 mm
0,01

0,001
100 1000
pressure difference in Pa

Figure 1: Tests results for the air tightness of PUR-sandwich panel joints

To fulfil the limit value, some important requirements have to be considered. These
requirements are depending on the core material.
2. Panels with core material of closed cell structure

At first the geometry of the joint itself can restrict great air streams. The key and slot joints of
panels have a positive influence on the tightness. In this context it is very important that the
abutting ends and surfaces of the panels fit into one another very well. For a good insulation it
is also important that the metal faces have as little penetration into the core as possible like it
is shown in the right picture of fig. 2. A bad solution is to have the metal face bent into the
core as it is done in the panel to the left in fig. 2. The problem is of particular importance for
thin panels (thicknesses up to 80 mm) where there are cases where the metal faces almost
touch each other in the joint. Joints always form a thermal bridge and the penetration of metal
worsens this [10].

Figure 2: Examples of different joint geometries

The next important point is the sealing tape. These days it is absolutely state of the art to use
sealing tapes in every longitudinal joint of the panels. Different kinds of sealing tapes exist in
the market [9]. The most important differentiation can be made by the cell structure. One can
distinguish between open cells, partly open cells and closed cells. All of them are used in
modern sandwich panels.
These different structures lead to very different characteristics regarding the air permeability.
Closed cell structures are practical completely airtight as soon as they have contact to the
joint, whereas open structures need some compression. The required level of compression is
depending on the cellular material. According to [4], the following table gives some guide
values:

Cellular Material Minimal compression for air tightness

PUR-foam, open cells 60 – 80 %
PUR-foam, open cells, impregnated by acrylate 50 – 60 %
PVC-foam, partly open cells 30%
PE-foam, partly open cells 15 %
PE-foam, closed cells -
 Impregnated open celled PUR-foam [5] Closed celled PE-foam [5]

Figure 3: Examples of sealing tapes

According to that information it is essential for the air tightness that the geometry of the joint
allows the required compression of the sealing joint.

Shadow gap

Sealing joint

Figure 4: Examples of longitudinal joints

If the shadow gap is closed for example before the sealing joint is compressed, it will not be
possible to get an air tight construction. Also the needed contact pressure plays an important
role. If the necessary compression can only be reached by high pressure, the right mounting
equipment has to be used.
For mounting the panels an exact knowledge of the tolerable width of the shadow gap is
necessary. This is the only possibility for the fitter to check the correctness of the construction
and to guarantee an air tight building envelope. The tolerances have to be small enough to
assure the required compression.

2. Panels with core material of open cell structure

For panels with core material of open cell structure as mineral wool a different sealant
solution is necessary. By these panels a sealant stripe of tight material with big flexibility
shall be placed in the longitudinal joint between the metal sheets. Here it is very important to
seal the joint between the sheets; otherwise an air stream through the open cell structure of the
core is possible. The joint profile geometry shall be designed for this sealant stripe. Two
examples are shown in figure 5. The sealant shall be placed on the warm side. In special
cases, e.g. walls with high wind pressure, sealants in both faces as shown in fig. 5 (on the left)
are considered meaningful.
 Sealing lip

Figure 5: Examples for a good sealing of mineral wool panels [7], [8]

Also for mineral wool panels, the tolerances play an important role. They have to be small
enough to assure the sealing.

3. Conclusions

Principles of good practice for the design of joints against thermal losses have been presented
in this document. Three points are of big interest. First, the geometry of the joint plays an
important role, second the right sealing stripe is of particular importance and perhaps the most
relevant item are the tolerances of fabrication and mounting. If attention is paid to all of these
points it is possible to design joints with a very good air tightness.
Only longitudinal joints are subject of this report. Of course, a lot other details like joints
between panels and windows or panels and the ground have an influence on the air tightness
of sandwich constructions.

References:

[1] EN 12114: Thermal performances of buildings - Air permeability of building

components and building elements - Laboratory test method, April 2000

[2] DIN 4108-2: Thermal protection and energy economy in buildings - Minimum
requirements to thermal insulation, July 2003

[3] DIN 18542: Sealing of outside wall joints with impregnated sealing tapes made of
cellular plastics - Impregnated sealing tapes - Requirements and testing

[4] Galileo – Kreatives Bauen mit Sandwich: Basis Info, chapter 4.9,
Version 2009-11-D1

[5] Homepage Iso-Chemie, www.iso-chemie.com, 18.02.2010

[7] Homepage RUUKKI, www.Ruukki.com, 15.03.2010

[8] Homepage Fischer, www.fischerprofil.de, 15.03.2010

[9] IFBS 4.02, Bauphysik – Fugendichtheit im Stahlleichtbau, IFBS e.V., Düsseldorf,
11/2004

[10] IFBS 4.03, Bauphysik – Wärmebrückenatlas der Metall-Sandwichbauweise,

IFBS e.V., Düsseldorf, 03/2010