Does Spray Foam Insulation Have An Odor

The good news is i had two spray foam jobs done both had an odor problem and the odors went away.

Does spray foam insulation have an odor.

The insulation company said that the insulation would be odorless. Tests will tell you nothing. Spf has an odor during the application process and for some time after. Running a ventilation fan continuously undermines the purpose of the spray foam which is to save energy.

Spray foam insulation is shipped as separate chemicals that must be mixed together prior to being sprayed. The space might not have been ventilated per manufacturer specifications. But i don t live there. Honestly i haven t smelled our spray foam insulation in a single one of the homes where we have made a follow up visit.

Even do it yourself two component spray foam kits occasionally produce smelly foam according to a report by larry burks and jill burks of cambridge n y. On warm sunny days i would say 70 degrees we can smell the insulation. The same smell when it was installed somewhat less but still significantly strong. The icynene after complete removal took about six years to go away to faint levels in the spring time.

It s real to them. Everyone s sense of smell is different. If you can smell the foam you ve identified the problem. We had open cell spray foam insulation placed in our attic in december 2010.

When the oms fan is running it s designed to vacuum odors and lingering humidity from your attic expelling it into the atmosphere. In the case of the closed cell foam blue foam basf the dead fish odor went away after 3 years. I don t recommend testing the air. How long the smell lasts will vary from person to person and job to job.

This can happen in two ways. It might also create a noxious odor. If the ratio for one or more of the chemicals is off due to contractor error or otherwise the foam might not insulate properly. A bad installation of spray polyurethane foam stinks.

The biggest common complaint however is a bad odor usually described as a fish like odor that lasts for months and is almost impossible to get rid of. Homeowner james polk who recently hired sunlight contractors to install approximately 3000 square feet of spray polyurethane foam in his destrehan home describes his experience which is typical of a job done right. Spray foam insulation odor. We have also found in our experience if a homeowner is hyper concerned about a lingering spray foam odor in their home they probably won t be disappointed.

So any odor detected by especially sensitive people is safe from a health standpoint. On a hot humid summer afternoon if by chance you get a whiff of spray foam smell while walking down the upstairs hall it s easy to manage. Properly applied by a professional spray foam should emit relatively low fumes that will altogether dissipate in about a week. Turn your oms fan on.

They will smell it.