Sticking Aerogel to steel

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

I am planning to fit a layer of 10mm aerogel to the outside of a steel column. Any recommendations on glue / other methods? (Please state if you’ve managed to do this before - my experience of contact adhesive is that it can behave very differently based on the material type and I’m not sure how well aerogel will take to it. 
 

https://www.buyinsulationonline.co.uk/product/spacetherm-aerogel-insulation?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=22363171127&gbraid=0AAAAAolHs10y0c_FTCj4HYGnIHug1AoAk&gclid=CjwKCAjw6rfSBhAqEiwA_yocplauhT7e_l1Z4u49lcBwb0LQX6mldg5QaCV0ZC2lrjISc1cW3JRo5hoCFTQQAvD_BwE

[Conor]

I used foil faced aerogel, easier to work with and stick down. I think I used double sided tape.

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

1 minute ago, Conor said:

I used foil faced aerogel, easier to work with and stick down. I think I used double sided tape.

Thanks - was this internal or external? Do you mind sharing where you got it from?

[Conor]

Internal on painted steels. Not a clue where I got it from, was five years ago.

[Super_Paulie]

i used a spray contact adhesive on my internal upright, stuck no problem. 

[SteamyTea]

Lumberjack

 

[JohnMo]

Mine came with double sided tape. Although I actually upgraded most of it 25mm PIR in the end 

[Nickfromwales]

Just use XPS tile backer boards, ranging from 6,10,12.5,15,18,20,25mm and so on.

 

You need zero air convection behind this, so horizontal lines of adhesive as well as vertical. 

[Mulberry View]

19 hours ago, Great_scot_selfbuild said:

I am planning to fit a layer of 10mm aerogel to the outside of a steel column. Any recommendations on glue / other methods? (Please state if you’ve managed to do this before - my experience of contact adhesive is that it can behave very differently based on the material type and I’m not sure how well aerogel will take to it. 
 

https://www.buyinsulationonline.co.uk/product/spacetherm-aerogel-insulation?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=22363171127&gbraid=0AAAAAolHs10y0c_FTCj4HYGnIHug1AoAk&gclid=CjwKCAjw6rfSBhAqEiwA_yocplauhT7e_l1Z4u49lcBwb0LQX6mldg5QaCV0ZC2lrjISc1cW3JRo5hoCFTQQAvD_BwE

 

It's dreadful stuff to work with. Do you have it yet? It emits a really weird powdery dust that feels horrible on your hands and that powderyness will stop anything reliably sticking to it. I used it to insulate the outer 2 faces of a pair of steel corner posts. The posts were onwardly flashed with an aluminium trim which would hold the insulation in place. I simply taped a breather membrane over the top of the Spacetherm, all the way round the post with foil tape to hold the insulation until the trim went on.

 

 

 

You'll struggle to adhere it in any meaningful way unless you buy their cold-bridging strips, which are enclosed in some sort of polythene and can then be glued/adhered to stuff.

 

As an aside, Proctor will deal directly with you and they were, for me at least, the cheapest source.

[SteamyTea]

Is it worth it, the k-value is not much better than PIR.

Spacetherm is not real aerogel, it is, as far as I know, fumed silica in a blanket.

[Redbeard]

1 minute ago, SteamyTea said:

Is it worth it, the k-value is not much better than PIR

 

Agreed. When Proctors started marketing it the stated lambda was 0.013.Over time it changed to 0.014 and then to 0.015W/mK, where I think it stands now. PIR 0.022 (some say 0.021) and phenolic 0.020 (some say 0.019). I have not looked at the price diff for some years but it used to be v considerable. Looks like 14mm of PIR will equate. I know you cannot get 14mm, but Celotex used to make 12mm. One source says they no longer make it and others say they do. One source refers to Xtratherm's 15mm board. I used to buy 2 sheets of 12mm at a time and the carriage exceeded the material cost!

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

7 hours ago, Mulberry View said:

 

It's dreadful stuff to work with. Do you have it yet? It emits a really weird powdery dust that feels horrible on your hands and that powderyness will stop anything reliably sticking to it. I used it to insulate the outer 2 faces of a pair of steel corner posts. The posts were onwardly flashed with an aluminium trim which would hold the insulation in place. I simply taped a breather membrane over the top of the Spacetherm, all the way round the post with foil tape to hold the insulation until the trim went on.

 

 

 

You'll struggle to adhere it in any meaningful way unless you buy their cold-bridging strips, which are enclosed in some sort of polythene and can then be glued/adhered to stuff.

 

As an aside, Proctor will deal directly with you and they were, for me at least, the cheapest source.

Is this aerogel or spacetherm? From the suppliers I’ve approached, aerogel is like a stiff board/sheet (these pictures look like a loose fabric). It appears that the term ’aerogel’ is used across a variety of products, but not all with the same thermal value.

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

23 hours ago, Nickfromwales said:

Just use XPS tile backer boards, ranging from 6,10,12.5,15,18,20,25mm and so on.

The thermal property of tilebacker boards is nowhere near comparable with aerotherm though.

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

On 08/07/2026 at 16:50, JohnMo said:

Mine came with double sided tape. Although I actually upgraded most of it 25mm PIR in the end 

I plan to do this internally, where I have the space available - I don’t have this option externally.

[Redbeard]

1 hour ago, Great_scot_selfbuild said:

Is this aerogel or spacetherm? From the suppliers I’ve approached, aerogel is like a stiff board/sheet (these pictures look like a loose fabric). It appears that the term ’aerogel’ is used across a variety of products, but not all with the same thermal value.

Have you got any links? I cannot find anything that is other than an aerogel/Spacetherm blanket stuck to a board - whether Magnesium Oxide or Plasterboard. I was loosely involved with the planning of a refurb in 2009/10. The contractors hated the pl'bd/aerogel laminate (a) for being so dusty and (b) as the mesh in which the aerogel was held 'picked up' when drilling for fixings, potentially hurting wrists or sending operatives spinning!

[Nickfromwales]

2 hours ago, Great_scot_selfbuild said:

The thermal property of tilebacker boards is nowhere near comparable with aerotherm though.

By the time its squashed or has fallen half apart, during cutting and installation, I'd beg to see anything that offered much of the assumed uplift there tbh. 

 

Any small thermal separation will offer huge dividends here, but hey-ho!

[SteamyTea]

@DamonHD had a similar product fitted a few years back.

 

It is worth noting that insulation is an inverse square law by thickness.

If say 5mm reduces the losses by x, doubling the thickness to 10mm will reduce the total losses by x + x/2.  3 times the thickness, x + x/2 + x/8, and so forth.

 

 

 

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

10 hours ago, Redbeard said:

Have you got any links?

Here are two companies I’ve spoken to:

https://coreprosystems.co.uk/thermal-insulation/
https://www.thermablok.co.uk/our-products/

 

I’ve sent them details of what I need and am waiting to see what comes back. A lot of valuable detail came out I. The call that I hadn’t found on any website. The description ’flexible’ is a bit misleading g as the bare material (not fitted to another type of board) doesn’t actually sound very flexible at all!

 

🤞🏻🤞🏻🤞🏻

[DamonHD]

9 hours ago, SteamyTea said:

@DamonHD had a similar product fitted a few years back.

Here and the 'See also' links:

 

https://www.earth.org.uk/note-on-Spacetherm-aerogel-thermal-insulation.html

 

And here, for lolz:

 

https://www.theregister.com/offbeat/2010/11/24/how-i-used-space-shuttle-tech-to-insulate-the-living-room/471707

Edited 1 hour ago by DamonHD

[Redbeard]

1 hour ago, Great_scot_selfbuild said:

The description ’flexible’ is a bit misleading g as the bare material (not fitted to another type of board) doesn’t actually sound very flexible at all!

 

Thanks for the links. You are right re 'flexible'. 'Soft' (ish) yes, 'squidgy' (a bit), but not flexible. I have had a look at the links and we all seem to be describing the same thing; a 'soft-ish but rigid-ish' insulation board often (but not always, bonded to plasterboard or MgO board. Very expensive and unpleasant to handle due to its powerful dessicant effect. In your links I see that the claimed lambda value of at least one variant has increased further to 0.016W/mK

[SteamyTea]

9 minutes ago, DamonHD said:

And here, for lolz:

Ah, the Register; Who Me

 

[JohnMo]

21 minutes ago, Redbeard said:

Thanks for the links. You are right re 'flexible'. 'Soft' (ish) yes, 'squidgy' (a bit), but not flexible

There must be different grades of it, as mine was well flexible, I actually stored it rolled up.

[JohnMo]

Mine came from here, good service 

 

https://enviroform-insulation.com/window-posts-and-lintels/

[Great_scot_selfbuild]

21 minutes ago, JohnMo said:

There must be different grades of it, as mine was well flexible, I actually stored it rolled up.

Was this aerogel spacetherm? (From what I’ve been able to ascertain it contains aerogel, but is a variation on the original aerogel product which started as a firm ‘flexible, not so flexible’ board). The spacetherm stuff definitely appears higher up the search results.

 

And I thought getting the ground truth on waste treatment plants was difficult! 🤣 trying to work out what is sales BS atm…