Breakthrough triple glazing project leads Lutley Windows to choosing REHAU

Location	Wednesbury, West Midlands
Installer	Lutley Windows
Year	2023
Product	TOTAL70C

Double glazing installation & repair window fabricator, Lutley Windows, now exclusively uses REHAU profiles following a successful, ground-breaking project with housing association, Midland Heart, earlier in the year.

Adopting an incremental approach to improving the energy efficiency of their homes, housing provider Midland Heart has been exploring how their existing practices may be supplemented by innovative technologies and new methods. In doing so, the organisation identified an opportunity to complete a triple glazing installation, in collaboration with existing supplier, Lutley Windows.

Lutley Windows was established in 2014 by Mark Taylor, director and owner of the business. Based in Wednesbury, West Midlands, the 30-strong team specialises in fabricating and installing a wide variety of quality double glazing products for residential properties.

After being asked by Midland Heart about the potential of fabricating triple glazed windows for a collection of homes in need of EPC upgrades, Lutley Windows swiftly approached REHAU about the potential feasibility of the project.

A key requirement was that the windows had to achieve a U-value of 0.8W/m²K. This was to be in line with the government’s Future Homes Standard regulation coming into force from 2025. With Mark finding that his existing suppliers’ profiles couldn’t meet the target, Luke Boban, Area Sales Manager at REHAU, stepped in to advise Mark on the specification for the windows.

Following a bespoke design and extensive modelling of the thermal transmittance, REHAU’s T70c 52mm profiles were chosen for the first-of-its-kind project and delivered a U-value of just 0.81W/m²K. A total of five windows were fabricated and installed in a successful trial run at a tenant’s home in West Bromwich in May 2023.

This industry and domestic housing first has seen a further 139 properties receive energy efficient triple glazing part of ‘business as usual’ that pre-empts any external wall insulation (EWI) works required to get each home to net zero.

And this hasn’t stopped there. Learnings from the project have shown that to meet net zero by 2050, the frame size needed to be further enhanced to 72mm and drip innovation added, and the product has since evolved to achieve this target and meet future external and internal wall insulation requirements.

Together Midland Heart, Lutley Windows and frame manufacturer REHAU are leading the sector to make triple glazing an affordable retrofit measure to support the Government’s EPC targets.

Quality service, quality windows

The project has already received a positive response from tenants, both around the high standard of work completed and the effectiveness of triple glazing in reducing their energy usage and keeping them warm in their homes.

Rob Kraska, Head of Assets & Delivery at Midland Heart, commented: “This exciting collaboration with Lutley Windows and REHAU to bring an affordable and approved product into the market on a large scale, without requirement to replace before 2050, demonstrates how working in partnership with our supply chain can help create positive change. We are confident that the actions we are taking will not only help bring our properties closer to net zero, but ensure we continue to deliver the right products to our homes, making a difference to both our tenants and the external environment.”

Since that trial, Lutley Windows has switched its supply, and now solely uses REHAU’s profiles for its commercial and trade work. On why they decided to onboard with REHAU, Mark Taylor said: “We hadn’t worked with REHAU before but we needed to reach out because none of our suppliers could find a solution that worked for the Dartmouth Street triple glazing project for Midland Heart. However, I’m very glad we took this leap of faith. From the service to the windows themselves, everything has been the highest quality."

“From day one when Luke got involved, he was so invested in getting this trial over the line. For us, it was REHAU’s value-added services that really spoke volumes about them as a supplier and business.

“Of course, the profiles are of the highest quality and really well engineered. What really stood out was when we onboarded with REHAU, everybody was so helpful and going above and beyond what’s expected. Luke and his colleague Paul even drove up to our offices, sat with us for a day to help us set up with their production systems, and gave our staff some training as well to familiarise and settle in.

“We now use REHAU’s profiles for the majority of our jobs, including using the profiles to fabricate door frames.”

Reflecting on the Midland Heart project and bringing Lutley Windows into the REHAU family, Luke Boban said: “The Dartmouth Street triple glazing scheme has been a brilliant opportunity for us to showcase the flexibility and performance of our best-selling T70 profiles.

“Our strapline at REHAU is ‘Engineering progress, enhancing lives’ and we’ve demonstrated this perfectly in this case. Lutley Windows were faced with a tall order of hitting the 0.8 W/m²KU-value, and we’ve done this for them and Midland Heart which we are incredibly proud of, especially as nobody else was able to come up with a viable solution. Not only this, we’re also very pleased to hear the positive feedback from the tenants. This really fulfils our goal of bettering peoples’ lives. We look forward to continuing our relationship with Lutley Windows and Midland Heart.”

For more about REHAU and its Window Solutions, please visit www.rehau.com/uk-en