Breather Membranes | Tyvek Breather Membranes

Breather Membranes Tyvek Breather Membranes

What are breather membranes?

Breather membranes are very practical, integral and popular product for building projects. There are a vast number of manufacturers who produce different breather membranes, in general breather membranes work to stop impurities such as rain and dirt from entering while allowing vapour to escape. Therefore, breather membranes work to protect internal structures and maintain the performance of the wall or the roof.

Where to use breather membranes?

Breather membranes are installed on wall or roofs. They are used on external or cold sides of the wall insulation, under the outside surface of the external lining or roof tile or even cladding.

To use breather membranes or not?

If you choose not to use breather membranes, the building would as the name suggest still be able to breathe. While vapour would still be able to escape, there would be a build up of impurities that be brought into the internal of the building. The impurities would be wind or rain driven, so that’s water or dirt and more. As explained this would weaken the integrity of the buildings structure.

The next scenario would be to use a membrane which in not permeable to vapour such as polythene , what would happen? Well while the building would be protected to the impurities of wind and water, the building would be protected from adverse weather, therefore providing greater protection to the building and its structure. But, the biggest downfall of this would be that while you would be able to protect the building from the outside there would be a big build up of vapour within the building that would not be able to escape. The building would end up with a lot of moisture caught up within the structure of the building which may cause structure damage in the future.