How Foamfrax can Improve your Project

1. Besides eliminating the cutting and piecing of board, Foamfrax technology minimizes airborne fiber potential by
encapsulating the fibers in the foam binder matrix.
Refractory ceramic fiber can improve efficiency,
quality and flexibility in insulation application projects.
Refractories
Installation
Solutions
By Greg Wazny, PMP
Senior Application Engineer, Unifrax
P
rojects in all industries and of all sizes are complicated, ever-changing,
almost organic endeavors. From the initial planning stage through to proj-
ect closing, a myriad of decisions determine a project’s success or failure.
Each decision can affect subsequent decisions and outcomes of the sub-
projects within the project, as well as the project as a whole.
The project triangle is the balancing act that takes place between the three main
components of any project: time, money and scope. Affect one, and you will often
need to adjust the other two. The refrac-
tories and insulating industries often
take the brunt of these changes due to
the fact that they are the “last ones in.”
One of the biggest complaints heard in
the field from refractories contractors is
that they need to be faster, cheaper and
do more with less. This can sometimes
seem to be an impossible task. How can
we get the job done quicker while still
giving the customer as much—if not
more—quality for their buck?
Insulation Issues
One of the most tedious portions of a
refractories contractor’s job is applying
back-up insulation according to a speci-
fied design. The process often requires
the cutting of board or brick to fit
around anchoring, as well as the inher-
ent issues involved with the transport
of material on the job site. If only you
could gun board as a back-up, the issues
of time and quality may be solved.
Unifrax looked at this issue and
developed the Foamfrax®
product line
of refractory ceramic fiber (RCF) and
low bio-persistent (LBP) insulations in
response. In particular, the Foamfrax
Refractory Grade (RG) line of prod-
ucts can help compress a project sched-
ule while improving quality and design
flexibility, as well as providing possible
cost savings.
Project Scheduling
Being at the end of a project typically
means that any and all timing problems
have already occurred before you’ve
even stepped foot onto the site. This
Product Profile #refractories #fiber
#insulation #efficiency
Industry Focus

2. ] Refractories Installation Solutions
will cause the project manager to have
to compress the schedule, either by fast-
tracking or by crashing the schedule.
Fast-tracking involves overlapping or
performing parts of the project in paral-
lel. Crashing involves adding resources
to speed up work. Either method comes
with risk.
A product that can be installed faster
than the typical product will not only
save time, but may even minimize risk.
With installation rates of 800 board ft
per hour (BF/hr) and up, Foamfrax can
take days or even weeks off the sched-
ule in comparison to installing board or
brick as back-up. Installation rates for
board average 35 ft²/hr of 2-in. board
per a two-man crew, or 35 BF per man
hour installed. In contrast, using Foam-
frax technology and a crew of four men
averages to about 200 BF per man hour.
With a ratio approaching 6:1, it is easy
to see how days, if not weeks, can come
off a project (see Figure 1).
Similar comparisons apply for brick.
The real time savings come when you
realize you can perform parallel por-
tions of the project without having to
add more manpower to crash the sched-
ule, which always adds cost. One of
the intangible effects includes increased
safety, not only through less handling of
the product, but also due to the fact that
Foamfrax is gunned with minimal dust or
rebound. This also means all other trades
may work in the immediate areas during
the gunning of Foamfrax products. In
addition, by substituting a portion of the
lining with a Foamfrax RG back-up, cure
schedules of the hard refractory working
lining can be shortened.
Project Scope
Project scope is defined as “the work
that needs to be accomplished to deliver
a product, service or result with the
specified features and functions.”1
This
is the hardest part of the triangle to
change. At a minimum, the outcomes
need to be as specified, but improve-
ment is always taken into consideration.
Consider how linings are currently
designed, and why they are designed
that way. A lining can be a full fiber
design, whether it is fiberwall, mod-
ules or a mixture of various fiber-based
products. This design will be the most
thermally efficient, but may not be
the most robust. Due to certain atmo-
spheres, physical abuse, chemical attack
and high velocities, a hard refractory
working lining may make more sense.
Hard refractory linings can be
cheaper and able to take more physi-
cal abuse, but are not as thermally effi-
cient as a fiber lining (see Table 1). This
led to the development of fiber-based
back-ups to hard refractories. Unfortu-
nately, this back-up has been limited to
board materials, which need to be cut
around anchors and have their seams
either taped or filled in. Typical thick-
nesses have been limited as well. A 2-in.
board is standard due to the high labor
required to mount either thicker boards
or layers of boards. This has limited the
thermal performance of hard linings.
With a gunned product like Foam-
frax RG, the thickness is relegated to
the overall system temperatures seen at
the interface of the Foamfrax and the
hard refractory. It is like being able to
gun board to the desired thickness with-
out the cutting and handling issues.
With the ability to ram plastic, pour
castable, and gun standard hard refrac-
tories over Foamfrax RG products, you
will free up your schedule even more
within hours of installation.
Project Cost
There is a right way and a wrong way to
complete any job. The biggest constraint
on quality is often the price. When
working on a major project or minor
repairs, the cost of the work performed
and materials used is often going to be
an issue. The easiest way to combat this
is through knowledge—and properly
educating the customer regarding what
they are getting for their money.
Foamfrax RG products can be
installed greater than five times faster
than traditional back-ups, bringing large
cost savings to the table. Reduced weight
provides another opportunity to save
money. Foamfrax RG products gun from
20-25 lbs/ft³, which equates to half the
Figure 1.With Foamfrax RG products, a crew of four can install 2 in. of back-up on this 10 x 40-ft wall in one hour.
Table 1. Energy savings.
Option Refractory Option
Exterior Surface
Temperature (°F)
Heat Loss/Area
(Btu/hr - ft²)
Annual Cost of Natural Gas/
Area (ft²/year)
Improvement over Option 1
1 12-in. dense refractory castable 400 1052 $39.76 N/A
2
2-in. foam/fiber veneer + 12-in.
dense refractory castable
346 786 $29.71 25%
3
8-in. dense refractory castable + 4-in.
foam/fiber back-up
231 355 $13.42 67%
4 12-in. ceramic fiber module 203 270 $10.21 74%
Conditions: 2,300°F operating temperature, continuous operation, 8,400 hours/year. Natural gas cost $4.50/MCF. Note that furnaces that cycle will realize additional savings
due to lower heat storage values associated with options 2-4 and decreased start-up and cool-down times.

3. density of lightweight products and 1/6
the weight of dense castables and refrac-
tories. When dealing with engineers and
designers at the beginning of a project,
these weight savings can equate to a
huge savings in superstructure materials,
motors, supports and concrete.
Last but not least, as shown in Table
1, process savings due to energy effi-
ciency can often pay for the installation
in itself. The most noted cost savings
may be due to lost time accidents and
how they affect the job site as a whole.
Gunning a material that is delivered via
a hose brings a level of safety attributed
to minimal material handling. A crew of
four installers—two nozzle holders and
two machine tenders—creates an envi-
ronment with little movement, minimal
material handling and increased safety.
What the Future Holds
Unifrax is committed to developing
new products and systems that can be
integrated into all aspects of industrial
thermal management. Whether it is an
industry need or customer request, Uni-
frax looks forward to being an industry
leader in helping solve the issues our
customers face.
For example, it was recently brought
to the attention of Unifrax that sound
absorption (i.e., sound proofing quali-
ties of Foamfrax) would be a good met-
ric to know for certain applications.
With this as a known but unquantified
quality of Foamfrax, testing began in
July 2014. Using an independent test
lab to follow ASTM C423 standards for
sound absorption, results were supplied
in August 2014 (see Table 2). Unifrax
will continue to listen to our customers
and the industry to try to stay ahead of
the curve when it comes to technology
and advancement.
For more information, visit www.unifrax.com.
Reference
1. Project Management Institute, A Guide to the Project
Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide),
Fourth Edition, 2008, ISBN 978-933890-51-7.
Table 2. Sound absorption.
Product Noise Reduction Coefficient (NRC) Sound Absorption Average (SAA)
Foamfrax Grade I 1.00 0.99
Foamfrax RG 0.95 0.93
Note: Tests based on 2-in.-thick samples following ASTM C423 standards for sample preparation.
Foamfrax RG is gunned and then troweled to match the profile design for the rammed plastic hot face.
Reprinted from Ceramic Industry © April 2015 www.ceramicindustry.com

4. SAVETIME,
SAVEENERGY
withournewest
generationofthermal
managementsolutions.
Time to save with Foamfrax®
Insulation.
Foamfrax®
Insulation provides a fast, easy way to
insulate or upgrade your furnace lining and realize
exceptional energy savings.
Foamfrax Insulation can be
used as an efficient monolithic refractory back-up.
It can also be gunned directly onto metal, refractory
or fiber surfaces, often times eliminating the need
for a complete tear-out.
Installation rates up to
1,500 board feet/hour
can dramatically reduce
downtime. In numerous
applications, Foamfrax Insulation has demonstrated
a substantial improvement in thermal performance,
saving thousands of dollars in energy costs.
Time to save with
Silplate®
Lining Systems.
Silplate®
insulating boards and
coating materials can withstand
high temperatures while main-
taining high compressive strength and low thermal
conductivity. Silplate’s physical properties do not
change, even under the highest operating temperatures,
assuring physical stability to the complete refractory
system. Silplate coating materials enhance fiber linings
to withstand wind/particulate exposure, physical abuse
and chemical attack. These high performance products
are ideal for a variety of demanding applications across
all industries.
For More Information
View application videos at Foamfrax
University on YouTube, visit the
Unifrax website, or call 716-768-6500. w w w. u n i f r a x . c o m