29 Apr Total Tools Overview and Installation Techniques
In this 6-part series, yellowblue engineer Dennis Grubb walks us through a comprehensive set of informational and training videos that breakdown yellowblue’s most popular products. See each of the most popular items sold through yellowblue, including how they’re installed and what benefits they offer.
Today we’re going to watch a comprehensive set of informational and training videos to show you some of our more popular products. We’re going to go over five different products today. We’re going to look at each installation setting, we’re going to watch the installers installing the products, we’re going to learn some installation techniques, and we’re going to understand and learn what the products will do for the end-user and for the consumer.
The first product we’re going to talk about is our reflective house wrap with vapor guard. We’re going to watch the installers actually install the product. Then we’re going to do a training set of videos showing the proper placement of the fastening system and how to install it. We’ll also watch a video on the actual effect— how it stops the heat from coming into the house and from leaving the house. The second set of videos that we’re going to do is for our attic blanket product. We have two varieties we’re going to talk about. We have air shield and we have echo shield. These are what we refer to as attic blanket products.
We’re going to watch the installers actually install it and we’re also going to learn and understand what it’s doing for the homeowner. We’re going to talk about how we install our solar-powered attic ventilation system, we’re going to learn about placement, we’re going to learn about the effectiveness of what the product will do for the homeowner and for the home itself. We’re also going to talk about attic intake ventilation, the importance of soffit ventilation coming into the attic for a more effective and a cleaner and safer attic environment. We’re going to talk about sealing up penetrations from the interior of the home, to the attic environment. We’re going to learn about the importance of not allowing any air from the living area to the attic area, and last but not least we’re going to talk about the importance of utilizing LED light bulbs throughout the house to further reduce the carbon footprint of the homeowner. So come join me. We’ll take a look at some of the installers today.
We have Eric and Jason out in the field. We’re going to watch them actually installing the product. We’ll take a minute and we’ll talk to them and have them explain what they’re actually doing and I think that by the time you’re finished watching this video, you’ll have a much better understanding of how the system works. So come on — let’s go take a look at them.
Now we’re here at the customer’s place where we’re going to be installing our revolutionary MLI reflective attic insulation. What we wanted to do is cover some of the very basic tools and some of the specialty tools that we’re going to need to get everybody started and to help them accomplish their jobs successfully.
So what we’re going to do is we’re going to get into one of our specialty tools here and what we’ve got here is a telescoping pole that extends and locks. On the end of this pole, we’ve got a rubber tip squeegee. We fasten these squeegees on here — either with some screws or with some tape — and make sure this head cannot come. We use these poles to reach out into areas that you wouldn’t otherwise be able to actually get your physical body into. We cut and prep our material and we use these poles to place it in place.
In terms of cutting the material, one of our favorite tools is just a standard household scissors. We found a couple nice ones at some of the home improvement stores that actually give you all of your fingers some room to get into the handles which is very nice. We do a lot of cutting so a good pair of scissors is very helpful. We’ve got your everyday standard utility knife, and again, we do a lot of cutting so a knife with a quick release and quick change blade which is also very helpful. Now, as I’m sure a lot of you guys are aware, attics are very dark places so we want to make sure that we’re able to light it up adequately so that we can do our job safely, effectively, and do the best job possible.
We’ve got LED headlamps. The reason the LED is important is because attics are very hot in the summertime and even in some of the other milder months, LED lights emit a whole lot less heat so we recommend everybody use LED lights whenever possible. We like to have a headlamp for every guy in the attic.
Then we’re going to move right on to our clamp lights. So here, we’ve got a regular old light bulb ballast which is attached to a clamp and a reflective hood. This allows us to aim our light and go ahead and attach our light with our clamp to any structures in the attic so we can apply light to dark situations and really get this thing lit up. Again, like we talked about, we like to use LED light bulbs. Number one — they use a whole lot less power, and number two — they emit a whole lot less heat.
We’re going to check out some of our protective wear. We recommend everybody get familiar with the types of materials that you’re going to find in your attic in terms of the thermal insulation that you see in your area. We recommend that everybody get the appropriate masks to protect your respiratory system from the materials that you’ll be working with on a daily basis. One thing that is important is make sure there’s a respirator valve. That really allows for easy breathing inside your mask.
We also recommend using eye protection. As you can see this type of eye-protection will seal all the way around your eyes and all the way around at your eye cavity. We like hand protection in the attic and we also like some rubber-coated gloves that allow us to really grip the materials and tools that we’re using. It makes life a whole lot easier. Then, my personal favorite — I like knee protection. We do a lot of squatting, a lot of kneeling, and if you can protect your knees you’re going to be able to do this job a whole lot longer.
We’re going to move right on down the line. This is what we call HVAC tape. When it’s appropriate, we need to use HVAC tape to fasten our MLI in certain situations. The reason it’s important to use HVAC tape is it’s the same principle as our MLI. It’s got a reflect side that allows the adhesiveness to stay cool, so the adhesive won’t release and a tape remains effective. Then, we’re going to go down our back row and we’ve got some standard tools here which I’m sure a lot of you people will be familiar with. You’ve got your standard stapler, a slap stapler, everybody’s going to need a flat bar, a hammer, and a cordless combo kit that includes a sawzall, a drill, and this kit happened to have a light as well as an impact.
For your power tool kit, you’re going to need to have a drill bit set. This particular drill bit set has a complete array of nut drivers, pilot hole drill bits, and all of your standard fastener heads. Everybody’s also going to need to carry either a wood boring spade bit or a drill bit big enough to allow a sawzall blade to get in when we’re installing our fans. So just make sure that your spade bit or your drill bit will allow for your sawzall blade to enter the hole.
Then in our back row, we’ve got some various forms of sealant. This is our roof sealant. We recommend using a polyurethane blend of sealant with our roof fans. There is a tube of this included in every kit. Then we’re going to look at some window and door foam and this is just another type of foam as well.
Anytime there’s a penetration in the ceiling or the ceiling plane from up above in the attic, we’re going to use foam to go ahead and close all those penetrations and prevent any heat loss or heat gain depending the time of year.
Last but not least, we’ve got your standard gun that’s going to allow us to apply all of our adhesives. I think that’s going to pretty much cover it. This should give you everything you need to do your job well.
