Thursday, March 2nd, 2017
Many homeowners never go down into their crawl space. They have a floor liner to protect their area, right? Unfortunately, not all vapor barriers or crawl space liners are created equal. In fact, some liners are more of a problem than a solution .Is your liner negatively affecting your crawl space? How do you find out?
It is popular among many builders and homeowners to lay down thin plastic (6mil) on crawl space floors. The building codes allow it as an option. But thin plastic (painter’s plastic) does not meet the criteria that the solution must not get ruined when someone crawls on it and must last as long as the house does. 6mil polyethylene easily rips and gets holes poked in it when you crawl on it or when critters make your crawl space home. Further, it is very difficult to attach to walls and can be easily torn down.
The researchers at Advanced Energy found that, while 6mil liners held moisture down okay, they encouraged thicker, stronger materials due to poor durability. Other contractors and homeowners reported that 6mil poly liners had to be repaired more frequently due to rips and holes that occurred after they went into the crawl space.
The other option for homeowners and builders is a liner that is 20mil thick, durable, installs along the crawl space walls and comes with an antimicrobial additive manufactured into the material. This liner is called CrawlSeal. The CrawlSeal Crawl Space Encapsulation System satisfies all of the repair criteria while dramatically transforming the area into healthy, usable space; providing a permanent solution to moisture control in the crawl space.
