Anyone have any experience with this stuff:
http://ceramicadditive.com/index.html

Does it work? If so how well? What kind of R value do you get out of it?

~ Matt

Matt wrote:
Anyone have any experience with this stuff:
http://ceramicadditive.com/index.html

According to some posters, it is great stuff. R19, at least.

OTOH, there are the facts.
http://www.tprl.com/Stherm.htm

"Matt" wrote in message
...
Anyone have any experience with this stuff:
http://ceramicadditive.com/index.html

Does it work? If so how well? What kind of R value do you get out of it?

~ Matt

Last summer before painting my home I sent emails and called them for a
client list that could be contacted. I had a thermal scan done on my home. I
was ready for a before and after product review. I got lots of claims but
not one customer that I could contact. No worries the scan was done by a
friend on the weekend. He has one in his company van.

My basic premise is if 20-40 mils of paint could insulate, then why is the
government not demanding that it be used in every new building? Why are not
the utility companies offering rebates for people to use the product. Like
they do for energy efficient products. Sure would be cheaper than building
new power plants.

Call your local utility folks and see what they say.

I have some of that . Will be trying it out in April when it warms up a
bit more here in Illinois.

On Mon, 28 Feb 2005 16:43:14 -0500, Matt wrote:

Anyone have any experience with this stuff:
http://ceramicadditive.com/index.html

Does it work? If so how well? What kind of R value do you get out of it?

~ Matt

I used some of their stuff, for two different applications.
1) They sell a rust sealer primer, a liquid grey paint with
some of their spheres mixed in.

2) A bag of spheres, shipped dry, and added to the paint on
site.

The application was some metal security bars and a stair rail
on the outside of a house. I was motivated to find a better
way to work around the rust/old paint problem because it took
me about three weekends to scrape, de-rust, black oxide, prime,
and top coat one bar set and I didn't want/have time for that
for every bar set (and I couldn't remove the stair rail).

I took two security bar sets to a pro to have them sandblasted,
hot-melt primered and hot-melt finish coated. (hot-melt == powder-
coat)

The stair rail I treated as if the product was really going to
work, so I did very minimal prep, no black oxide treatment.
I slapped on their primer (containing spheres), (one coat only,
but they recommend two) followed by one top coat which I mixed
with some dry spheres.

Then we had the January and February rains, which brought us
to the third wettest season on record.

The bars I hand-treated with all the prep, prime, and coat
faired okay. There is some rust showing up on them again
(and since I used rust treatment *and* primer gray I don't
see how it could!).

The pro-treated bars finish looked the best, but plenty
of rust is showing through the surface now. I'm disappointed.

The stair rail is holding back the rust the best. I think
I can see a little brown-like coloring happening to the
otherwise white topcoat, but I can't see the obvious rust
coming up yet.
The finish is the least-professional of the three, as the
spheres look like I dumped some beach sand into the paint.
I don't care too much. I'm saying to myself, "Well, in
an emergency my hand will grip well to that handrail."


So, to recap: Their paint-onto-rust primer seems to work
well, provided you can tolerate a sand-like finish.
It may look expensive at first, but the labor it saves
more than pays for itself. I give it a thumbs-up.

I never believed that a thin layer of paint could ever
provide a high R-value, so I didn't buy the product for
that purpose.

The dry spheres are easy to ship but kind of pointless
to buy if you're looking for their special primer.
I guess I give them a Miss Cleo rating. Use them if
it makes you feel good.

Regards, Scott