Solid wall insulation – Window Sills

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Solid wall insulation – Window Sills 2

Solid wall insulation – Window Sills

When solid wall insu­la­tion is installed on the exter­nal walls of a prop­erty it is nor­mally 10cm thick or more. What this means is that the sill of pre­vi­ously installed win­dows will stop well before the edge of the insu­la­tion. This doesn’t look great to be hon­est and could cause issues with water runoff, so the sills need to be extended out beyond the edge of the exter­nal solid wall insu­la­tion to pro­vide an attrac­tive end fin­ish. Click on the image below to learn more about water ingress and damp.

In an ideal world, we rec­om­mend replac­ing the win­dows at the same time as get­ting the insu­la­tion works done. The rea­son for this is twofold; the first is that if you come to replace the win­dows in the future, the process of remov­ing and refit­ting them doesn’t com­pro­mise the integrity of the solid wall insu­la­tion. The sec­ond rea­son is that the sills can been ‘pre-extended’ when the win­dows are made, so if for exam­ple you have wooden sash win­dows being installed – the sills on the new win­dow already have taken into account the addi­tional 10cm of insu­la­tion, so when they are in and the insu­la­tion is installed they look great.

For many of us though, the cost involved with replac­ing win­dows and doing exter­nal solid wall insu­la­tion at the same time is just too great. So when it comes to extend­ing win­dow sills what options do you have?

XPS or uPVC sills to match existing window profile

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Well the first thing to con­sider is what the exist­ing sill looks like, the idea is to keep the look of the extended sill as close to the orig­i­nal as pos­si­ble. If the exist­ing sill is made of con­crete, by far the best way of extend­ing it is to use XPS. XPS is a really strong type of poly­styrene so can take the addi­tional impacts and loads that you might expect from nor­mal win­dow sills. The XPS is treated in the same way as the insu­la­tion, but many of our cus­tomers do decide to go with a slightly dif­fer­ent colour ren­der to enhance the fact the sill pro­trudes out of the solid wall insu­la­tion!

If you have uPVC win­dows in place, the sills tend to be much thin­ner com­pared to con­crete ones. In this case we use a uPVC sill exten­sion board, which is attached on top of the exist­ing sill using a com­bi­na­tion of sill exten­sion board fix­ings and adhe­sive.

The final option and def­i­nitely the best in our opin­ion is to use the pow­der coated stain­less steel sills. The great thing about these is that they can be pro­duced to match the exist­ing look of the sill. Have a wooden win­dow fit­ted in your prop­erty? No Prob­lem! We have pow­der-coated sills that per­fectly mimic the look and feel of real wood.

Another advan­tage of the stain­less steel sill is that they are incred­i­bly strong. The sills will out­last the win­dows in most cases, and the pro­tec­tive pow­der coat­ing will ensure that it never weath­ers over time.

Our partners at EWI Store discuss the function of sills, beads, and verge trims here, so click through and have a read!

At Be Con­struc­tive we give our clients the option to install any type of win­dow sill when we insu­late the exter­nal walls of the prop­erty. We obvi­ously will give guid­ance where we can, but at the end of the process we want the cus­tomer to be happy with their new-look home!

FINDING AN APPROVED OR RECOMMENDED INSTALLER

We have teamed up with EWI Pro to help provide homeowners with an approved and recommended installer network across the UK. EWI Pro are one of the UK’s leading render manufacturers and our experiences with them have always been extremely positive. They have excellent technical support and a vast array of quality products. Their list of approved and recommended installers are specialists, so by choosing one of them to complete your project, you can be assured that the work and the materials installed on your property will be to the highest standard.

If you are looking for an approved or recommended EWI Pro installer, please send an inquiry by filling in your details on the form provided!.







    Unsure of what materials you require?

    Use our EWI solid wall insulation materials calculator to calculate exactly what materials you will need for a particular job.

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    We are delighted to announce we have partnered with the EWI Pro Training Academy in Aylesbury to bring you a series of professional installer training courses.

    We have 6 unique courses to choose from, each targeting a different area of the External Wall Insulation installation process.The training courses are completed over the course of a half-day or full day, and installers will receive an EWI Pro certificate upon completion.

    Why this programme?

    The EWI Pro Training courses are designed with an all-round approach to learning. You will be given the chance to learn about installing EWI systems through a mixture of classroom and practical, hands-on training.

    This programme also allows you to learn from experienced EWI professionals with years of industry experience. This way, you will leave the course equipped with the most relevant skills.






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