‘It’s That Simple’: Hotrod XL Used for Quebec Elementary School

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The project: ‘Unconventional’ elementary school near Montreal

In Saint-Eustache, Quebec, just outside Montreal, two local elementary schools — both of which have become increasingly dilapidated over the years — are being replaced with one new, state-of-the-art facility.

Equipped with a nearly $34 million grant from the Quebec Ministry of Education, contractors have been building a new school with 29 modern, interconnected classrooms, along with office spaces and a gymnasium, spanning 6,600 m² (around 71,000 square feet) with capacity for approximately 700 students.

‘It’s That Simple’ | Trim-Tex Hotrod XL & Quebec Elementary School | Fire + Sound Solutions

Builders here are especially focused on adopting the latest innovations and constructions practices. This is because, of course, innovative solutions present new opportunities to save time and labor costs, but also because of Quebec’s “new generation of schools” program — requiring (among other things) the use of sustainable materials, highly adaptable educational spaces and large, open areas that encourage collaboration.

For interior contractor Construction MGP, this dedication to the most advanced construction systems extended to their drywall finishing phase. Most notably, they made the decision to abandon time-consuming, complicated caulks for their code compliance needs, instead embracing the latest innovations in the field of preformed firestopping.

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The product: ‘We chose the Hotrod XL to save time’

By using any of Trim-Tex’s Fire + Sound Solutions — in this case, the Construction MGP team selected our Hotrod XL bead — you are better able to control multiple potential problems at once: fire, sound, movement and a clean aesthetic finish. Where an intumescent caulk will likely harden and/or shrink back over time, making it ineffective at solving any of these issues, a preformed firestopping solution like Hotrod XL is engineered to stay flexible and resilient for the lifetime of the wall system.

“We needed to have one inch of deflection between the gypsum and the ceiling,” says Jimmy, the drywall finishing foreman for Construction MGP (translated from French). “We had a look at the traditional way, getting a carpenter for the caulking process. After that, have the plasterer applying his standard trim, which is a 9000 [Tear Away L Bead]. Then, we saw in the Trim-Tex catalog that this new product Hotrod XL could replace all those steps. We decided to try it, and we saved a lot of time”

Hotrod XL consists of a rigid PVC bead (colored pink for easier inspection), with three unique attachments: (1) compressible foam, which, when inserted into a wall joint, fills the gap with permanently flexible materials, (2) innovative intumescent tape, which, when exposed to heat, expands to 30 times its size, further compressing the adjoining foam to form an airtight seal within the wall joint, choking off the spread of smoke and fire; and a tear-off strip, which leaves behind a clean, finished edge.

Added altogether, with Hotrod XL, the Construction MGP crew is equipped with a powerful, versatile firestopping solution.

The payoff: ‘It's new, but it's not more complicated’

Installation of Hotrod XL is simple — using spray adhesive, staples and joint compound — especially for crews, like Construction MGP, who already use vinyl trim with any frequency. Since the finishers at Construction MGP were already using Trim-Tex Tear Away L Beads against any detail where code compliance was not an issue, adopting this new solution for their head-of-wall joints required almost no additional training whatsoever.

Using their old methods, a carpenter would need to come in to install caulk at the head-of-wall, wait for it to cure, then a drywall finisher would need to come in later to install trim on top of it. By using Hotrod XL, the contractor is able to skip that first phase, and do the entire process in a single step — saving them time, labor and frustration.

“We were able to observe a faster installation speed,” Construction MGP Project Manager/Estimator Jérémy Garant tells us, “then a reduction in additional construction steps.”

“There were no problems fitting the new bead,” adds Jimmy. “It's new, but it's not more complicated. This is the same step as installing a normal [Tear Away] bead. It's only a question of keeping one inch between the ceiling and the drywall. It's that simple.”

Thank you to the team at Construction MGP for allowing us to come onsite and observe their process. To learn more about their work, you can visit their website here. If you’d like to get a look at Hotrod XL for yourself, you can now request a free sample — hit the button below to get started.

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Hotrod XL is a powerful and versatile fire rated drywall accessory, built to slam the brakes on the passage of smoke, fire and sound.

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