Fabric ductwork

I just finished a project where we used fabric ductwork, and I just wanted to share some observations.

This was for a chemical storage room that is heated and cooling to maintain a temperature setpoint.  They have to use 100% outside air (no recirculation) and they were having temperature control issues because of a lack of air distribution in the room.  (If you'd like to hear more about that issue, let me know...I don't want to bore you with details if you're not interested.)

What I liked about the fabric ductwork (AKA "duct socks"):

• No corrosion issues to worry about
• Able to get good air "throw" down the entire length of the duct sock.  We specified nozzles at the bottom of the duct, spaced every 3-4 feet, to get 30' throw straight down.
• The ductwork is installed over the aisles in this room between storage racks.  Workers use forklifts to load and unload products from storage racks, and now we're not worried about them running into the ductwork.
• Much cheaper installation cost than comparably sized spiral ductwork with supply diffusers

Overall, this project went very well and is doing just what we wanted it to do.  It even installed faster than we expected (although not as fast as the manufacturer thought it would...).

If anybody else has had experience--good or bad--with fabric ductwork, I'd like to hear about it.  The traditional applications I've seen are in:

• Indoor pools
• School gyms
• Manufacturing
• Food processing plants (because it's washable)

This isn't meant to be an ad for any particular brand of fabric ductwork.  I priced it up through several vendors, and if anyone's interested, I'll share who I ended up working with.

Hi Matt:

Thanks for your post.

We received a response to your post on the facebook page for this website. Below is what AirPac Portable Air Conditioners & Heaters had to say regarding your post:

"We have used fabric ductwork for temporary buildings and tented events. The good -- goes up quickly and easy to change the layout. You can also get the ductwork with difusser holes to distribute the air. The bad -- you lose cooling over the length of the run because it's not insulated."

thanks for the early morning news about fabric ductwork.  we have fabric ductwork in our gym pool and it has held up rather well over the years, just recently we  experieced what appears to be the loss of support of the fabric.  because of its height and its location close to the edge of the pool , we will be hiring a speciality contractor to repair or replace the supports.

AirPac:  From talking to different duct sock manufacturers, I learned that there are fabric options that mimic duct insulation, so that might help you.  That adds to the material cost, but shouldn't affect installation time.

The rule of thumb I've always followed is that exposed ductwork doesn't need to be insulated because it's in conditioned space.