Woody Bagwell, F&S insulators foreperson, knows the importance of keeping it tight.

His team can find themselves anywhere on campus, from the underground steam tunnels to up on top of a roof. Insulators go wherever the pipes are.

And on the Urbana campus, chilled water and steam are the primary arteries by which buildings are heated and cooled. Insulators work makes those pipes keep their desired temperature for as long as possible, both in terms of time and distance. They do this by adding a rubber, metal, or plastic covering to exposed piping.

The last thing you want is an uncovered hot pipe, which will a) send heat out into the atmosphere, like a person without a hat on a snowy day, and b) become a safety issue, if someone touches that hot pipe with their bare hand.

Potential problems are just as important when it’s hot outside and the chilled water is sent across campus – condensation, which can become a drip, is a constant battle.

“In Housing facilities, we have some issues with older piping,” Bagwell said. “It’s a two-tiered system and old rubber doesn’t hold up to the heat, so it gets brittle. These new rubber ones are easy to glue to. They’re good up to 300 degrees, so they won’t get hard and brittle. The new stuff is a lot better than the old days.

“You don’t have to worry about the drips. Sometimes, above the ceiling tile, you see it. It gets nasty up there if it’s got drips. With new insulation, the heating/cooling system will run better and won’t cost as much to run.”

White Hot

Color can make a difference, as Bagwell notes on hot piping, a thin white, metal covering can keep temperatures down as much as 30 degrees, compared to gray.

“Since I got here (two years ago) we switched to all white metal in the steam tunnels now,” Bagwell said. “We try to reduce the heat, that’s a big factor down there. I think, it would knock it down tremendously (if the all of the pipes in the steam tunnels were all white).”

Insulation of course needs to cover all the turns that pipes may take, including at corners, which are mostly 90, 45, or 22.5 degrees. Bagwell helped the shop acquire a shearer to make pieces of specific requirements, instead of buying each piece pre-formed.

“I’m trying to make good changes to the shop,” he said. “We don’t buy metal by the piece anymore, we buy it by the roll, which makes it cheaper. We then cut it, roll it, and bend it ourselves.”