TIMBERFRAMEANDSIPS

Structural insulated panels (SIPs) are engineered building systems used in floors, walls, and roofs for residential and commercial buildings. The panels are made by sandwiching a core of rigid foam plastic insulation between two structural skins of either oriented strand board (OSB) or OSB and plaster-based drywall. This results in a building system that is extremely strong, energy efficient and cost effective... OSB is an engineered wood product formed by layering flakes of wood in specific orientations. OSB has similar properties to plywood, but is uniform and less expensive... Three types of foam currently used in panels are urethane, extruded polystyrene (XPS), and expanded polystyrene (EPS). Urethane cores are laminated to the skins with either an adhesive or by an injected in liquid form between separated skins. XPS and EPS cores must be laminated. In this writing, we will focus on XPS and EPS.