Don’t blame masonry contractors for calling it the answer to a prayer.
Yes, there’s now a stucco base coat with no measurable respirable crystalline silica (SiO2), the deadly mineral dust documented to cause silicosis, cancer, and other permanent, irreversible diseases.
This advance in life safety now makes it possible to cut, grind, or mix stucco in a one- or three-coat application with minimal requirements under Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) silica dust guidelines.
For example, OSHA requires the use of an integrated water delivery system or dust collection shroud attached to a HEPA vacuum when cutting or grinding stucco. Those requirements are optional with a breathe-safe mix.
Developing a safe stucco formulation has long been a masonry goal. Silica dust is 100 times smaller than a grain of sand, making unfiltered passage to the lungs easy. Even a minor task like patching a small outdoor crack should require a P100 half-mask. It’s a grim occupational hazard for one of housing’s most popular exterior siding systems.
Safety Without Sacrifice
The good news begs a question: What do you sacrifice to achieve safe stucco?
“We often hear, ‘This sounds too good to be true,’” admits Roland Fox, inventor of SafeLite SBC, the product’s name, and founder and owner of Utah-based HangTite Blended Cement Products, a leader in innovative, pre-blended mortar solutions for masonry contractors.
“There is no performance sacrifice. The product complies an assortment of ASTM standards, ICC-ES AC11 durability testing and carries the IAPMO UES ER-922 shield, along with hundreds of successful project installations,” Fox says.
Surprising Familiarity
“The material looks and feels the same. It’s priced the same and applied the same way as any stucco. There’s no compromise, except maybe weight: A SafeLite SBC bag is 25 pounds lighter than a standard base coat mix for the same coverage,” Fox adds, noting it can be applied to a variety of substrates, including self-furring metal lath, concrete, brick, masonry and other materials.
What explains the high performance without crystalline silica in the composition? Without giving away too much, the proprietary mix includes aggregates with unique characteristics that don’t require respirable silica. “There are trace amounts in cement, no matter what you do,” explains the veteran industry innovator. “By not having respirable silica in the aggregate creates a product well below OSHA standards, which have been getting tighter and tighter.”
Cherry on the Top
Fox says specialty contractors are still expected to file a crystalline silica mitigation plan, just as they do today. The difference is, there are no filtering steps or measures they are required to take. They need to show they are using HangTite SafeLite SBC, which eliminates further mitigation concerns.
For now, the mix is available through building product distributors throughout the Mountain West region. Home building pros and contractors elsewhere that have questions or are interested in specifying SafeLite SBC for their next project, should contact HangTite direct.
“It’s humbling to see pros switching to the product because it’s lightweight and performs so well,” observes Fox. “The absence of deadly silica dust is the cherry on top.”
Learn more about how breathe-free stucco base coat eliminates respiratory risk without sacrificing cladding high performance.