Expanding foundation foam - GIF

[nova_robotics]

That stuff's crazy. It's like 5000 - 6000 psf or something.

[mwmkravchenko]

That stuff's crazy. It's like 5000 - 6000 psf or something.

Where did you find this? I can't find any technical data.

[nova_robotics]

Where did you find this? I can't find any technical data.

A structural engineer told me that years ago. I'm just regurgitating what he was saying when he was praising the stuff. But based on what I found below it looks like there are a number of structural foam products that far exceed that number.

Here's the datasheet for (rigid, non-expanding) Corning Foamular boards. They make Foamular 400, 600 and 1000. That corresponds to 40 psi (5760 psf), 60 psi (8640 psf) and 100 psi (14400 psf). They recommend it for under concrete foundations, roadways, airport runways and railbeds.

http://www2.owenscorning.com/worldwi...hDensBro_E.pdf

Here's an expanding foam product called Polylevel. The manufacturer says it's good for almost 6000 psf.

https://www.polylevel.com/technical-information.html

This website says their under-foundation polyurethane expanding foam product is good for 7200 psf, but that website is suspect to me so take it with a grain of salt.

https://www.dalinghausconstruction.c...hane-injection

Here's another one called GeoLift, and it comes in two densities GeoLift 4.0 and GeoLift 6.0. The 4.0 is good for 58 psi (8352 psf) and the 6.0 for 110 psi (15840 psf).

https://huntsmanbuildingsolutions.co...04.0%20TDS.pdf

[mwmkravchenko]

A structural engineer told me that years ago. I'm just regurgitating what he was saying when he was praising the stuff. But based on what I found below it looks like there are a number of structural foam products that far exceed that number.

Here's the datasheet for (rigid, non-expanding) Corning Foamular boards. They make Foamular 400, 600 and 1000. That corresponds to 40 psi (5760 psf), 60 psi (8640 psf) and 100 psi (14400 psf). They recommend it for under concrete foundations, roadways, airport runways and railbeds.

http://www2.owenscorning.com/worldwi...hDensBro_E.pdf

Here's an expanding foam product called Polylevel. The manufacturer says it's good for almost 6000 psf.

https://www.polylevel.com/technical-information.html

This website says their under-foundation polyurethane expanding foam product is good for 7200 psf, but that website is suspect to me so take it with a grain of salt.

https://www.dalinghausconstruction.c...hane-injection

Here's another one called GeoLift, and it comes in two densities GeoLift 4.0 and GeoLift 6.0. The 4.0 is good for 58 psi (8352 psf) and the 6.0 for 110 psi (15840 psf).

https://huntsmanbuildingsolutions.co...04.0%20TDS.pdf

Ok Much less than Concrete. Concrete is 300PSI for non air entrained concrete.

[nova_robotics]

Ok Much less than Concrete. Concrete is 300PSI for non air entrained concrete.

Oh definitely weaker than concrete. But (generally) much stronger than the soil it's sitting on. The foam is going to have 3-4x the compressive strength of the dirt that's under it. So it's still an extremely useful material.