This course opens with something that should worry you a little: two engineers are handed the exact same detail — same drawing, same geometry, same method. They each run it, and they get different answers. The reason has nothing to do with a mistake you could circle on the drawing. One of them simply typed in a different value for the insulation.
A perfect model fed the wrong material values gives you a confident, professional-looking, wrong answer. This course teaches the quiet, unglamorous skill that everything else in the course depends on: knowing what materials actually do, and choosing the right numbers to describe them.
You will learn a material's two properties — thermal conductivity, the headline number that decides whether a wall is warm or cold, and vapour resistance, brought in for one specific job: the condensation check — and the awkward cases that need special care, from air gaps to a steel stud crossing an insulation layer.
The course walks through the key material families used in real façade systems — insulation, structural and backing materials, boards and sheathings, membranes, glazing, and sealants — reading each one through the same two properties.
It gives you a practical, defensible way to choose calculation values: ranking data sources by reliability, distinguishing a declared value from a design value, choosing the unfavourable end of a material's range for the check at hand, and handling a layer that mixes materials rather than describing it with one clean number.
Presented by Eugene Korch (façade engineer and IAST Programme Director), this course closes with the discipline every later calculation in this series depends on: recording the source of every value you use, because the geometry gets the attention, but the material values decide the answer.
Included in Facade Intelligence Professional Membership (FI PRO)
By the end of this course, you will be able to:
Explain why two engineers can run the exact same calculation on the same drawing and get different answers, and why that risk lives entirely in the material values chosen
Distinguish a material's two properties in building physics — thermal conductivity and vapour resistance — and explain why heat is the primary property and vapour is reserved for the condensation check
Explain why thermal conductivity is a fixed material property, while thickness turns it into a layer's thermal resistance, and describe why resistances stack
Identify the three awkward heat-loss cases that need special care: air gaps, surface resistances, and a high-conductivity element bridging an insulation layer
Explain the vapour resistance factor and its equivalent air thickness, and describe the parallel between the heat and moisture properties of a material
Explain why the dry, declared conductivity value is used in almost every calculation, and identify the one genuine exception where a wet, in-use value applies
Apply the "tight on the warm side, open on the cold side" rule as a materials decision, and explain why getting a membrane on the wrong side builds a moisture trap
Describe the thermal and moisture character of the key material families used in façade systems: insulation, structural and backing materials, boards and sheathings, membranes, glazing, and sealants
Rank material data sources by reliability — a manufacturer's declared data, standard tables, and software defaults — and explain why the most specific source available should always be used
Distinguish a declared value from a design value, and explain why the design value, adjusted for real in-service conditions, is the honest one to calculate with
Two engineers, the same drawing, the same method — and two different answers, because of one changed material value.
Every material's two properties: thermal conductivity as the headline, vapour resistance reserved for the condensation check.
Thermal conductivity as a fixed material property, and how thickness turns it into a layer's resistance that stacks with the next.
The awkward cases that need care: air gaps, surface resistances, and a high-conductivity element bridging the insulation.
The vapour resistance factor and its equivalent air thickness — the moisture mirror of conductivity and resistance.
When wetting actually enters a calculation, and the one genuine exception: permanently wet locations.
The "tight on the warm side, open on the cold side" rule as a materials decision, and what happens when a membrane ends up on the wrong side.
Insulation families and the balance between heat performance and vapour behaviour.
Structural and backing materials: concrete, masonry, steel, and timber, read through both properties.
Boards, sheathings, and membranes — the thin layers that quietly decide whether a wall stays dry.
Glazing and sealants: even glass and a bead of sealant are materials doing a job.
Ranking material data sources: a manufacturer's declared data, standard tables, and software defaults.
Declared values versus design values, and why the design value is the honest one to build with.
Choosing the unfavourable end of a material's range, depending on the check being run.
Non-uniform layers and the equivalent value that honestly accounts for a mixture of materials.
The one idea to carry forward: a result is only ever as good as the material values chosen for it.
Why recording the source of every value is a discipline that protects the whole course going forward.
What comes next: the climate and boundary conditions that a material value always works against.
Course Overview
Course Objectives
How to Navigate the Learning Materials
Introduction Video
Lecture
Post-Lecture Reading List
Certificate: Download & Share
This course is designed for:
Anyone choosing or reviewing material property values for a façade calculation.
Architects and Architectural Technologists specifying materials for façade build-ups.
Junior Façade Engineers building a disciplined approach to calculation inputs.
Envelope Designers and Façade Specialist Contractors.
Building Envelope Consultants.
Project Managers and Design Managers who want to understand what really decides a calculated result.
Format: Self-paced online course with video lectures
Duration: Approximately 30 minutes
CPD Points: 2 hours structured CPD / 2 Learning Units
Access: 12 months from enrolment
Certificate: CPD certificate issued upon completion
Prerequisites: Recommended — our fundamentals courses on energy and moisture, glazing, and façade systems (helpful context, not required)
Built around one unsettling fact: two engineers, the same drawing, and two different answers — because of a single material value.
A clear, two-property framework for every material: thermal conductivity first, vapour resistance for the condensation check only.
A practical hierarchy for choosing values: manufacturer data, standard tables, and software defaults, ranked honestly.
Covers the full material palette of a real façade: insulation, structure, boards, membranes, glazing, and sealants.
Sets up every later calculation in this series: the discipline of choosing the right value, and writing down where it came from.
Membership fees start from £320 per year
