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Twin Brothers Donate Time, Foam
By Jessica A. Baris
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VENDOR TEAM
Twinsulation Spray Foam
SPF contractor
4637 Route 145
Durham, New York 12422
(518) 239-8945
www.twinsulation.com
Spray Foam Polymers
SPF manufacturer, rig manufacturer
(800) 853-1577
www.sprayfoampolymers.com
Graco
Spray gun
88-11th Avenue NE
Minneapolis, Minnesota 55413
800-690-2894
www.graco.com
Meyer Insulation
Insulation Blowers, Sprayers & Vacuum Systems
1700 Franklin Blvd.
Libertyville, IL 60048-4407
(888) 463-3908
www.meyerinsulation.com
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Twin brothers Jayme and Andrew Kuhn don’t have much sibling rivalry when it comes to conducting business. The brothers make a good team, and they jumpstarted their spray polyurethane foam insulation company in 2004. Being identical twins, they named their company Twinsulation Spray Foam—it seemed like the right choice to describe their relationship and trade!
Recently, the brothers decided to give back to their community by donating their time and skill to a Habitat for Humanity project that students at a local trade school were involved with. Twinsulation started off by organizing a spray polyurethane foam demonstration for the students to introduce them to the project.
 “The students at Quest Star Three Trade School are learning about building science,” says Jayme Kuhn. “They asked us if we would be interested in working on one of their projects. We’ve worked with another Habitat chapter before, so we said yes.”
The students at the trade school did their part by building the house. The Twinsulation brothers donated 1 ½ sets of Thermoseal 800 open-cell and ½ set of Thermoseal 2000 closed-cell spray foam to insulate the home.
When the Kuhn brothers drove up to the job site, they were eager to get started on the two-story, 2,688-square-foot house, but the only thing that didn’t look so inviting was the steep hill they’d have to climb.
 “We had to park the rig on a steep hill,” says Kuhn. “It was difficult, and there was snow on the ground, too.” But part of spray foam contracting work is overcoming those hurdles, so in the icy cold low 20s of early March this year, the three-man crew lugged its 310 feet of hose from the rig to the house.
When the crew arrived, the students had already prepped the house by covering the windows and doors with plastic. The crew further prepped the windows and doors for foam application by drilling holes in the support beams.
“We had to drill the headers out above the windows and doors to fill them with open-cell foam,” says Kuhn. “We are picky about making sure envelopes are as tight as can be. They are just 1-inch holes, so we fill it, and then cut it clean.”
 The crew sprayed the home’s envelope. In six hours, they applied 5 inches of Spray Foam Polymers’ Thermoseal 800 to the exterior walls on the main floor, 9 inches of the 800 to the attic ceiling, the above-grade basement walls with 5 inches OC, the below-grade basement concrete walls with 3 inches CC, and the rim joist with 7 inches.
Kuhn said that they got the job done with an air-powered, PTO-driven rig that was custom built by Spray Foam Polymers. “It’s all air-powered and uses heat from the engine to heat the chemicals,” he says. “All hose heat is off the anti-freeze, and the primary heaters heat off the anti-freeze. It’s a neat system.”
The application was pretty straightforward, says Kuhn, and an upshot to the project was that they didn’t have to use space heaters for this job since the HVAC system was installed and running to keep the house warm.
 Once the foam was cured, Rich, the “cutting” guy, came in and shaved the excess foam with a pneumatic wire brush. “We vacuum up the scraps with our Meyer Insul-Vac insulation removal vacuum,” says Kuhn.
The home was built for a family with a disabled son, and that’s what matters most to Kuhn. “I would do it again because [we] care about other people,” says Kuhn. “Everyone knows that there are people who need insulation and can’t afford it. In the spray foam business, you are mostly working for rich people. Most people don’t build a 7,000-square-foot home to save energy.”
To learn more about Habitat for Humanity’s cause, readers may visit www.habitat.org.
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