Introduced at the 2015 National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) annual International Builders’ Show (IBS), Georgia-Pacific Gypsum delivers a new wallboard providing home buyers with the increased safety and security they value most. Patent-pending ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board is the only standard 1/2-inch interior wallboard to be enhanced with fire-resistance properties for use in a 45-minute UL classified fire rating.

Conventional home construction consists of using 1/2-inch drywall for walls and ceilings. Home builders have only been able to provide fire-rated wall and ceiling assemblies to home buyers with a heavier, more expensive, traditional 5/8-inch Type X drywall product or one-half-inch Type C drywall product. With Georgia-Pacific’s new 1/2-inch ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board, home builders can now provide customers with a cost-effective option for increased fire resistance in their new home or remodel construction.

In a third-party controlled testing environment, wall assemblies constructed with Georgia-Pacific’s new 1/2-inch ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board lasted longer than assemblies fabricated with current one-half-inch lightweight gypsum board on the market.

“Georgia-Pacific Gypsum is committed to developing products that resonate not only with building professionals, but with families that desire increased safety in home construction,” said Jason Peace, director of product management for Georgia-Pacific Gypsum. “We surveyed more than 500 people in the residential space and found that, like our families too, an overwhelming majority of homeowners ranked fire safety as their number one concern for natural disasters in their home. Our advanced engineering has taken the benefits of a 5/8-inch fire-rated wallboard and made it available in a more versatile 1/2-inch drywall board.”

Georgia-Pacific’s new 1/2-inch ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board solves three critical pain points for residential building professionals desiring increased fire-ratings in their home construction:

• As a 1/2-inch fire-rated wallboard, it can replace ALL standard and lightweight 1/2-inch walls, including 24-inch o.c. ceilings; there’s no need to change the wall assembly
• It lowers the transmission of sounds between rooms more effectively than competing lightweight 1/2-inch wallboard—a common acoustic request from home buyers who currently have “lightweight” drywall installed their homes
• Fire-rated assemblies that are typically reserved for commercial construction can now be achieved in residential construction with ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board

Georgia-Pacific Gypsum will display the new ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board in Booth S2615 at the NAHB International Builders’ Show, taking place in Las Vegas, Jan. 20-22.

For more information on Georgia-Pacific’s new ToughRock Fireguard 45 Gypsum Board, including availability, or other Georgia-Pacific Gypsum products, visit www.GPGypsum.com.