Ergohome - Leadership in SIPs

ErgoHome uses SIP panels in its construction

Notably the ErgoHome has a SIP floor, walls and roof thus ensuring very high strength and insulation on all 6 sides.

What are SIPs?

Structural Insulated Panels (SIPs) are a modern composite building material.

Why are SIPs special?

This sandwich performs both structural purpose & insulation in one thickness. Traditional construction methods use two separate parts, the structural envelope (brick wall or steel frame) with a separate cavity or insulation layer.

How do SIPs work?

SIPs are a foam block sandwiched between timber sheathings. The three component parts of a SIP panel once combined achieve a very high load carrying capacity (25 tonnes per panel). In addition to strength SIPs are also very thermally insulative, keeping the heat or cold outside your home. 

When was it invented and how popular are SIPs today?

The Forest Products Laboratory in the USA was the first to experiment with SIPs in 1935. SIPs are now an established building material in the States with 5 million square metres manufactured annually. 

Ergohome - Sponsors SIPs Research

Working with the University of Birmingham since 2007 ErgoHome has supported research into the performance of SIPs. Working with the Civil Engineering School extensive scientific testing has been undertaken. Our team has performed the widest range of transverse, compression & racking tests on a number of different test samples.

Barriers to the adoption of SIPs

Ergohome recognised that SIPs are not yet a mainstream building material because it’s mechanical properties are not well understood. Popular engineering design tools such as Revit, Pro-Engineer & CATIA all rely upon published tables of material performance. These tables exist for established building materials such as concrete, timber and steel. Once tables are recognised for SIPs then structural models can be realised in Finite Element Analysis (FEA) and any given design optimised for material use and specific design features.

ErgoHome conducts FEA analysis

The Ergohome team now has SIPs data to allow FEA analysis of our own home design and third party concepts. This professional approach to using SIPs in construction will give greater confidence to engineers & allow better-optimised SIP solutions.

ErgoHome is a contributing member to SIP panel associations UKSIPs & SIPA

see attachment for more details.