VanGuy6678
Member
So I decided insulate my 2010 Sprinter 2500 HR 170 with closed-cell sprayfoam. I chose it for its unmatched R-value per inch, for its impervious-to-water property, and because it creates a true moisture barrier between sheet metal and van interior.
Some learnings:
• I applied Rattletrap all over the place beforehand. Wish I had saved the money and weight and simply let the cured sprayfoam do the job of vibration / noise dampening.
• prep is labor intensive (I taped all surfaces with red duct tape where I did NOT want sprayfoam to adhere to metal). Namely, all ribs. Also covered front seats/dash/ and wheelwells with plastic. Covered floor with cardboard roll from Home Depot.
• Wash all surfaces with citrus degreaser where sprayfoam will be applied. This will ensure it sticks.
• If you plan to add rivnuts anywhere like I did, add them before spraying foam. Just be sure to cover them with tape don't worry about foam gunking up threads. It'll act as threadlock
• cover all smaller holes that provide access to hollow ribs / enclosed cavities with tape. When primary sprayfoaming is done, uncover these holes and use Great Stuff Big Gap Filler with included flexible plastic hose to fill these areas.
• glad I ran wiring first (obviously) and had a completed electrical plan to work from. I wrapped all exposed wires in plastic prior to spraying. Also taped wires in places where expanding sprayfoam might push it inward toward vehicle interior. You don't want wires pushed out beyond the level of your finished walls & ceiling.
• I also took plenty of photos and a video of all wires before I sprayed. Good for future reference. Actually, this is good practice all along the way - take photos of all that will be hidden in the end. In some cases, include a tape measure in the photo, for locating things precisely in the future, if needed.
• I used two sprayfoam kits I bought online from foamitgreen.com. The "605" kits. Still ran out before I could fill the rear doors. Bette to buy 3 kits and plan to use the excess in your house, sell it to a friend.
• suit up with a tyvek suit, and HIGH-QUALITY respirator. Hat and protective eyewear too. And hydrate beforehand. The stuff creates a lot of heat as it's sprayed (parts A + B chemicals are mixed in the gun during application, this generates heat). After 1 hour of spraying, I was literally drenched in sweat. Nearly passed out. So hydrate beforehand!
• spray in light coats. THIS IS KEY. The foam gets quite warm during allocation, and this warmth causes metal to expand. The the foam cures very rigid, so whatever degree of deformation of metal panels occurs, is going to remain (rigid foam wants to remain in its cured shape).
• I wanted a full flush fill (no uninsulated space in my walls, ceiling, and headliner area. To achieve this, one needs to apply A LOT of foam. This is because it expands unevenly. You'll end up with peaks and valleys. And if you don't want valleys in your finished cavities, then your peaks will be very high. And this adds to material needed, and adds to trimming labor.
• this stuff hardens in 2 minutes, cures in 24 hrs.
• ok, so now you're done, right? True, it's all cured and insulated. And give it a test drive - you'll be DELIGHTED in the reduction of road noise. It's dramatic.
• but now the real LABOR begins. You've got to trim all that foam flush to interior ribs. In any case, use a full face mask respirator. You'll need to keep the dust out of your eyes and lungs. I used this (totally worth it):
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0002...SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=3m+face+mask+filter
I experimented with many tools. A disc grinder with coarse flap wheel makes way way too much dust. Serrated saw made specifically for cutting OPEN-CELL foam: fail.
Basically, what I found best is a coarse sawtooth blade, but not one with a ground edge. Think good old wood handsaw. Except the large surface area of the blade creates tons of friction as the blade makes its way through a cut.
And flexible is important. In hindsight, I wish I'd been aware of this tool:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B005X...8+inch+saw&dpPl=1&dpID=31cWEwrDdEL&ref=plSrch
I used this for bulk removal of excess foam:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00E6...i=AC_SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=insulation+saw
In experimenting with various techniques, I found two most useful:
1) stab tip into a large peak of foam, twist handle. Chunk breaks off. Kind like chipping away at ice.
2) Hold handle in one hand, tip in other (with grippy gloves). Bend the blade so it bows toward the surface you want to trim. Move the blade forward and with a slicing motion; once dug in, twist the blade. Very controllable size chunks can be removed this way. Again, Experiment.
So now that you've got all surfaces roughly down to finished level (within 1" anyway), switch tools. Thanks to Iron Tent for sharing this tip, use the sharp-point side of a curry comb like this:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000H...curry+comb&dpPl=1&dpID=41uuyYZvoVL&ref=plSrch
Scrape the surface from multiple directions. For quicker (but rougher) material removal, use your second hand to press down on the coils as you pull the tool by the handle with primary hand. Do this until you've reached your final flush surface.
Take care to remember where your wires are. I sliced a few by mistake. Spliced them back afterwards, no biggie.
Lastly, use the Great Stuff Big Gap Filler I mentioned earlier to fill remaining voids in wall and ceiling ribs.
One question you may be asking: so where do you spray, and where not to?
I sprayed my entire ceiling. Driver and passenger side walls. I also will spray my back doors, and the top half of sliding door. Where you find latch cables in these doors, no big problem. Just unbolt and wrap the latch mechanisms / rear handle mechanism before spraying inside the doors. Once cured, use a loose hacksaw blade to chisel out recesses so you can reinstall the latch mechanisms. I wasn't concerned about burying the sheathed cables in foam. Doubt they'll ever just break and need to be replaced. But if so, foam can be scraped out.
Oh, and disconnect tail light wires in rear doors beforehand, and cover them in plastic, then tape them outside the door. You'll reconnect them afterwards. Just take note: wherever those wires unplugged from, you need to protect that area from foam so you can reconnect afterwards.
I avoided spraying the lower half of the sliding door. So much cabling in there, I'll just use rock wool or sections of rigid polyiso / batts combination.
I also didn't spray the vertical channels at rear corners of the van. I'll stuff those areas with batts. Good to keep access to the wiring that runs through them.
That's about it. Let me know if I forgot anything. Sprayfoam is not the only way to insulate a van. It's just the method I chose for mine.
Next phase of conversion: I'll tape strips of 1/4" closed cell upholstery foam (the kind you buy in rolls) to all exposed ribs. ( I have a bunch leftover from filling in the corrugated floor). This will minimize thermal bridging between 1/4"'plywood wall panels and heat-conductive van ribs.
Thanks for reading - I hope this helps others out there
Some learnings:
• I applied Rattletrap all over the place beforehand. Wish I had saved the money and weight and simply let the cured sprayfoam do the job of vibration / noise dampening.
• prep is labor intensive (I taped all surfaces with red duct tape where I did NOT want sprayfoam to adhere to metal). Namely, all ribs. Also covered front seats/dash/ and wheelwells with plastic. Covered floor with cardboard roll from Home Depot.
• Wash all surfaces with citrus degreaser where sprayfoam will be applied. This will ensure it sticks.
• If you plan to add rivnuts anywhere like I did, add them before spraying foam. Just be sure to cover them with tape don't worry about foam gunking up threads. It'll act as threadlock
• cover all smaller holes that provide access to hollow ribs / enclosed cavities with tape. When primary sprayfoaming is done, uncover these holes and use Great Stuff Big Gap Filler with included flexible plastic hose to fill these areas.
• glad I ran wiring first (obviously) and had a completed electrical plan to work from. I wrapped all exposed wires in plastic prior to spraying. Also taped wires in places where expanding sprayfoam might push it inward toward vehicle interior. You don't want wires pushed out beyond the level of your finished walls & ceiling.
• I also took plenty of photos and a video of all wires before I sprayed. Good for future reference. Actually, this is good practice all along the way - take photos of all that will be hidden in the end. In some cases, include a tape measure in the photo, for locating things precisely in the future, if needed.
• I used two sprayfoam kits I bought online from foamitgreen.com. The "605" kits. Still ran out before I could fill the rear doors. Bette to buy 3 kits and plan to use the excess in your house, sell it to a friend.
• suit up with a tyvek suit, and HIGH-QUALITY respirator. Hat and protective eyewear too. And hydrate beforehand. The stuff creates a lot of heat as it's sprayed (parts A + B chemicals are mixed in the gun during application, this generates heat). After 1 hour of spraying, I was literally drenched in sweat. Nearly passed out. So hydrate beforehand!
• spray in light coats. THIS IS KEY. The foam gets quite warm during allocation, and this warmth causes metal to expand. The the foam cures very rigid, so whatever degree of deformation of metal panels occurs, is going to remain (rigid foam wants to remain in its cured shape).
• I wanted a full flush fill (no uninsulated space in my walls, ceiling, and headliner area. To achieve this, one needs to apply A LOT of foam. This is because it expands unevenly. You'll end up with peaks and valleys. And if you don't want valleys in your finished cavities, then your peaks will be very high. And this adds to material needed, and adds to trimming labor.
• this stuff hardens in 2 minutes, cures in 24 hrs.
• ok, so now you're done, right? True, it's all cured and insulated. And give it a test drive - you'll be DELIGHTED in the reduction of road noise. It's dramatic.
• but now the real LABOR begins. You've got to trim all that foam flush to interior ribs. In any case, use a full face mask respirator. You'll need to keep the dust out of your eyes and lungs. I used this (totally worth it):
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B0002...SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=3m+face+mask+filter
I experimented with many tools. A disc grinder with coarse flap wheel makes way way too much dust. Serrated saw made specifically for cutting OPEN-CELL foam: fail.
Basically, what I found best is a coarse sawtooth blade, but not one with a ground edge. Think good old wood handsaw. Except the large surface area of the blade creates tons of friction as the blade makes its way through a cut.
And flexible is important. In hindsight, I wish I'd been aware of this tool:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B005X...8+inch+saw&dpPl=1&dpID=31cWEwrDdEL&ref=plSrch
I used this for bulk removal of excess foam:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00E6...i=AC_SX110_SY165_QL70&keywords=insulation+saw
In experimenting with various techniques, I found two most useful:
1) stab tip into a large peak of foam, twist handle. Chunk breaks off. Kind like chipping away at ice.
2) Hold handle in one hand, tip in other (with grippy gloves). Bend the blade so it bows toward the surface you want to trim. Move the blade forward and with a slicing motion; once dug in, twist the blade. Very controllable size chunks can be removed this way. Again, Experiment.
So now that you've got all surfaces roughly down to finished level (within 1" anyway), switch tools. Thanks to Iron Tent for sharing this tip, use the sharp-point side of a curry comb like this:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B000H...curry+comb&dpPl=1&dpID=41uuyYZvoVL&ref=plSrch
Scrape the surface from multiple directions. For quicker (but rougher) material removal, use your second hand to press down on the coils as you pull the tool by the handle with primary hand. Do this until you've reached your final flush surface.
Take care to remember where your wires are. I sliced a few by mistake. Spliced them back afterwards, no biggie.
Lastly, use the Great Stuff Big Gap Filler I mentioned earlier to fill remaining voids in wall and ceiling ribs.
One question you may be asking: so where do you spray, and where not to?
I sprayed my entire ceiling. Driver and passenger side walls. I also will spray my back doors, and the top half of sliding door. Where you find latch cables in these doors, no big problem. Just unbolt and wrap the latch mechanisms / rear handle mechanism before spraying inside the doors. Once cured, use a loose hacksaw blade to chisel out recesses so you can reinstall the latch mechanisms. I wasn't concerned about burying the sheathed cables in foam. Doubt they'll ever just break and need to be replaced. But if so, foam can be scraped out.
Oh, and disconnect tail light wires in rear doors beforehand, and cover them in plastic, then tape them outside the door. You'll reconnect them afterwards. Just take note: wherever those wires unplugged from, you need to protect that area from foam so you can reconnect afterwards.
I avoided spraying the lower half of the sliding door. So much cabling in there, I'll just use rock wool or sections of rigid polyiso / batts combination.
I also didn't spray the vertical channels at rear corners of the van. I'll stuff those areas with batts. Good to keep access to the wiring that runs through them.
That's about it. Let me know if I forgot anything. Sprayfoam is not the only way to insulate a van. It's just the method I chose for mine.
Next phase of conversion: I'll tape strips of 1/4" closed cell upholstery foam (the kind you buy in rolls) to all exposed ribs. ( I have a bunch leftover from filling in the corrugated floor). This will minimize thermal bridging between 1/4"'plywood wall panels and heat-conductive van ribs.
Thanks for reading - I hope this helps others out there