5 Mistakes Spray Foam Contractors Must Avoid

It’s a great idea to become a spray foam contractor. This type of insulation is highly demanded today in the building and construction for a variety of reasons. However, it’s important to understand how to do this business right to ensure you get good returns from your investment. There are mistakes you have to avoid if you’re to make some good money as a spray foam contractor. To avoid learning the hard way, here are the mistakes to avoid. 

This is likely to cost you about 30 percent more foam to get the specified thickness. Installing more foam than required is an obvious way to lose money in the long run. Using more material than required isn’t a good idea for the contractor. If your applicators use inappropriate spray technique, uneven layers of spray foam are likely to be sprayed leading to use of more material than budgeted for the project. The solution is to train your team in proper spray technique. Additionally, ensure that your applicators understand industry practices like:

Safety

Health

Troubleshooting

Maintenance of equipment

This is likely to reduce the yield by about 20 percent. To avoid using cold substrates requires a space heater. Colder substrate leads to less coverage per pound achieved. This might take about 20 to 40 percent more foam to cover a similar area. The solution is to add 15 to 20 degrees to the minimum temperature recommended by the foam manufacturer. A small space heater heats a 20 by 20-foot space with wood substrate to an acceptable level in a short while. Concrete substrates take a bit longer and larger spaces require a forced air salamander heater. 

It’s very important to invest in the best sprayfoam equipment from a leading brand on the market. Additionally, regular equipment maintenance is important to keep everything in great condition before taking on customer jobs. Equipment breakdown is time wasting and leads to failure to accomplish jobs in time. You’re likely to incur more labor costs since the project will be taking longer than planned. The worst thing is that these delays are likely to make customers become frustrated with your service. 

Relying on bad directions wastes a lot of precious time and energy. Consider having a member of the team visit the site beforehand. This one will get to know the exact location and distance to reach there. This allows budgeting for fuel site requirements, and traffic patterns to allocate appropriate time. Spending a lot of time looking for the customer’s site is likely to make the crew tired and frustrated even before the project commences. 

Finally, having a well-trained and highly experienced foam applicator is very important. This will guarantee an appropriate foam application that meets customers’ expectations. Poorly trained, tired, and sloppy applicators are likely to cause mistakes like applying more foam than required. The right applicator verifies use of appropriate equipment, necessary supplies, and correct foam application by crewmembers. Trained applicators have competitive pride in their workmanship to offer quality service that beats the competition.

Conclusion

To make good returns from the spray foam industry requires avoiding costly mistakes than those above. This is reinforced by investing in quality equipment and having highly skilled staff.

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