Eurotubes makes a move!

By Bob Pletka 06/17/11

To the delight of our local customers (not to mention us) in late 2010 Eurotubes finally moved into our new digs! We decided to build and use what is called SIP’s panel construction, so the walls are six inches of wood clad foam and the roof is ten inches of wood clad foam. Everything comes in pieces cut from the factory and gets assembled onsite.

This makes for a really tight building with a huge “R” factor so it doesn’t take much to heat and cool it. Wiring was a bit of a challenge as you have to pull wire thru two inch and a half diameter chases that run horizontal thru the panels at outlet height and switch height.

I quickly learned that going around corners takes a bit of finesse and patience… There are vertical chases about every four feet. I found that using a paddle bit for wood, attached to a long extension, was handy for drilling my own chases when necessary. We also buried electrical conduit before the slab floor was poured, so routing circuits to any part of the building and up into an internal wall was quick and easy.

We decided to leave the open truss look on the ceiling in all areas except the studio and we blacked it out for a bit of a club feel. All in all we are really happy about how the building turned out! We even have our own “Tube Gargoyle” guarding the entrance, and yes, if you look at the photos in the “ET Building” album those are real tube sockets that we embedded into the concrete!

You might think that the foam construction would be good for keeping the noise level down both inside and out but unfortunately that’s not the case. It’s just about the same as stick frame construction without insulation! So while the “R” factor for SIP’s panels is better than stick frame construction with regular insulation, it does not cut down the transference of sound as well.

When it came time to finish the studio here it was a real education for me! All of that will be covered in another post!

Bob