Posted October 21, 2019
Healthy and sustainable home awareness has seen the rise of various certification programmes like Homestar, which measures the health, warmth and efficiency of New Zealand houses.
A lot of respiratory and other health issues are caused by the cold and damp environments that we live in. 1 in 7 children have asthma and 1 in 6 people (over 700,000 Kiwis) have a respiratory disease, which costs the country over $6b every year.
Heat loss in a home happens in a variety of different places including 15% through the slab the house sits on. This is why it makes sense to insulate the entirety of your home, especially if you want to remain comfortable, healthy and save on energy bills.
The concrete slab is the first phase of a new house build but it’s often the last consideration when trying to improve thermal efficiencies and home comforts. When you insulate everything else in the house, it makes no sense to ignore the floor beneath you. Which is why it’s a good investment spending a little more on an insulated slab to ensure many years of comfort.
MAXRaft is all about creating comfortable and healthy year round living temperatures in your home through foundation insulation. In fact we offer New Zealand’s only fully insulated concrete slab to increase the performance of your home from the ground up.
Comparing a MAXRaft slab to a standard concrete slab without insulation will cost approximately 10% more, but you win with ongoing energy savings whilst living in a safer and more comfortable home environment.
MAXRaft delivers three times the building code requirements
The Building Code requires an R-value of 1.3. R-Value is the measure of resistance to heat flow through the defined material. The higher the R-Value the less heat will transfer through the surface, making the system more energy efficient. MAXRaft’s performance is three times the building code and our insulated foundations will ensure you use less energy, therefore save money.
In addition to our standard MAXRaft slabs for stable ground, we also offer the MAXRaft TC2 range which is engineered for homes built on less stable ground, in particular the TC2 type ground encountered in Christchurch or when moderately or highly expansive soils are encountered.
MAXRaft loves the environment
MAXRaft® is constructed using New Zealand made CFC-free Expanded Polystyrene (EPS). An environmentally friendly product, and 100% recyclable, EPS has long been used in the construction industry worldwide for providing lightweight, effective insulation.
MAXRaft provides the same structural integrity as waffle floors, while providing superior insulation. MAXRaft uses polystyrene, which is an ideal material when insulating your home, and it’s manufactured and precut in our factory before sending materials to the building site where everything fits together quickly and efficiently like a jigsaw puzzle. The benefit of this approach is that we control waste and recycle materials.
The main benefits of MAXRaft:
We work closely with architects, engineers and builders and can either handle everything from quote to full design, engineering design to council consent, manufacture, pre-cut to final product install, or prepare everything for your builder to install on site.
With R-values of approximately R4.5 and BRANZ appraised status, we help make the building consent process as easy and quick as possible.
Your home’s slab cannot be replaced so when building make an informed decision and choose a fully insulated MAXRaft® concrete slab to improve your home’s comfort and energy use.
