Insulation of sloping celilings
Insulation should always fulfill one, sometimes several purposes: It should insulate the interior and protect it from heat loss, noise, penetrating cold or heat. For each of these requirements, there is the optimal building material, which differ in their quality and density.
Heavy and soft building materials are used for effective sound insulation. If the building material has both properties, it is ideal for buffering both high and low frequencies.
For insulation against summer heat, especially in the area of the roof structure, we recommend the use of insulation that is as heavy as possible, but soft. With its high weight per unit area, Stuffing hemp is the product of choice for this purpose.
Classic thermal insulation should be as light as possible, wool or wood fiber can be used very well here.
What all natural insulation materials have in common is their hygroscopic property: they absorb moisture and can transport it on by capillary action. The risk of mold in the wall structure is almost completely reduced as the moisture can be removed from the room. Almost all natural insulation materials do not lose their insulating effect when they are damp.
Hemp should be used in its raw state or as loose darning material instead of needled fleece. This enables a completely pure, clean application. The disadvantage of almost all insulation materials that are offered as mat material is as follows: the production of mat insulation materials requires the incorporation of a support fiber. In 99% of all cases, this support fiber consists of a plastic.
Using wood fibre boards is common, widespread and acceptable from a building-biology perspective. Unfortunately, however, it is largely unknown that a support fibre is added to the flexible mat material. As a result, the material cannot simply rot down, and disposing of the insulation is considerably more problematic. To this day, this is too rarely recognised, and the otherwise impeccable insulation material still has to be disposed of as waste wood or via an incineration plant.
Sheep's wool insulation in drywall construction
The only insulation that is offered as mat material and does not require any supporting fibers is wool insulation. Wool fleeces, needled directly and tightly, are built up in any thickness and thus manufactured as rolled goods or mat goods. Wool insulation is often frowned upon: insects, moths and other pests like to nest in wool and damage it. However, this is not the case with all types of wool. The manufacturer Lehner Wool adds a biocide-free wool protection agent to its products, which prevents moth infestation of the wool. In northern Germany, the use of wool is relatively uncommon, in southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland it is much more widespread.
Sound insulation and summer heat protection
Insulation materials that do completely without the support fiber made of plastic are wool and loose darning materials. Loose hemp as a stuffing material can also be installed in sloping ceilings and overhead without any problems. The hemp is inserted between the rafters and behind the counter battens by vigorous tamping. The roof area will later be clad with Clay building boards. With this simple processing, there is no waste and thorough work is flawless.
Cellulose, on the other hand, does not require any plastic-containing additives. If you want to use it as insulation, you have to weigh the cheap material price against the fact that this building material is not easy to build yourself. The installation can only be carried out by specialists: with the help of a blowing machine, the cellulose is blown into cavities, on the top floor ceiling or in the roof area. The blow-in technique can, however, also be used for insulation made from wood and hemp fibers.