Rim joist spray foam insulation in Rocky Mountain House treats the band of timber sitting on top of the foundation where the floor structure lands. It is a narrow strip running the whole way round the building, it is almost never sealed, and out here it is the first thing worth buying rather than the last.
The cheapest thing you can do to a house heated with propane
On a house running on expensive heat, every stream of air leaving the building is costing several times what the same loss costs on a gas line in town. The band is a continuous opening at the point where the structure meets the foundation, it runs the full perimeter, and it leaks for the whole heating season. Sealing it is a small job with no demolition where the basement is open, and on a propane-heated Rocky Mountain House property the arithmetic on it is better than almost anything else that could be done.
The band on a house that is heated by wood
There is a second reason it matters here. A wood-heated house pulls air, because a stove needs combustion air and it takes it from wherever the building is leakiest. That is frequently the band, which means cold outside air is being drawn in at floor level around the whole perimeter to feed the stove. Sealing it does not starve the appliance, it makes where the air comes from a decision rather than an accident, and that is worth having a conversation about at the same time.
Where the crawl space meets the basement
Houses out here have grown. An addition on a crawl space, a porch, a lower level added under part of the building, a garage attached later. Each of those brings its own band and its own junction with the original structure, and that junction is the least likely part of the whole house to have been sealed by anybody. They are all reached the same way on the same day, and doing one while leaving the others just moves the draught somewhere else.
What is actually in the bays right now
Open a basement ceiling in almost any house here and the joist bays are either empty or hold a piece of batt somebody pushed in later. Batt slows heat and it does not stop air, and the joint between the sill plate and the top of the concrete is an air joint. Closed cell foam goes in as a liquid, gets into that joint and stays stuck to both the timber and the concrete, which is why it is the correct product for this detail specifically.
Rim Joist Spray Foam Insulation Rocky Mountain House: Common Questions
How big a job is it? Small. No demolition where the ceiling is open, usually part of a day.
We have a wood stove. Will sealing starve it? No, and it is worth planning where its combustion air comes from rather than leaving it to chance.
How is the rim joist handled on a house that has been added to twice? Then there is more than one band and a junction between them. They all get done in the same visit.
Size the assembly with the R-value calculator, then get a free Rocky Mountain House quote. More on Rim Joist Spray Foam Insulation Alberta.