With the ever increasing performance levels of solar panels, home and building owners want their roofs to be high performance with a longevity to match or even surpass the lifespans of the electricity generating systems they support.
Problem
A competitor’s foam coating, applied nine years ago, was failing badly on the 3,500 square foot flat roof. The homeowner’s inspection had found extreme blistering with some as large as three square feet in area.
They represented high risk areas for leaking and certainly made the roof unsound for a major investment of photo-voltaic panels which most involve penetration of the roof membrane with fasteners, or, in the case of ballasting, additional pressure of weight that would have made the blisters even more vulnerable.
With an acrylic topcoat, there were additional concerns about adhesion for any new protective membrane.
The weather was hot and humid with temperatures in excess of 100 F. However, nights cooled off rapidly, creating dewy conditions that means no coating work until the moisture had burned off around 10.30 am.
Solution
Ecodur has nearly three times the adhesion of most conventional roof coating. It is VOC-free, and has a nearly 28-year record of withstanding UV and extreme weather conditions. It can be applied very successfully on some of the most difficult substrates to coat such as asphalt, tar and gravel, and cementitious roofs.
Most importantly is self-leveling and seeps well into anomalies such as cracks, crevices and seams that are starting to fail. In this case, with the large blisters, it was important that they be filled neatly and the exposed edges from preparation work, be completely sealed. It never loses its ‘dialed in’ hardness and flexibility and there is no time limit too to future repairs with Ecodur as it never loses its ability to re-bond.
Application Results
Preparatory work included removing the blisters and clearing off all loose granules from the old foam coating. It is estimated that about 2,000 lbs of granules, dust and small debris were removed. Inspection of the old acrylic coat showed it was still suitable for overcoating with Ecodur which gets excellent adhesion with acrylics and silicones.
The applicator, San Diego Roofing, had already concluded that because of the size of the blisters, which were treated first, silicones would have been unsuitable for a repair job as the thickness required would have meant the silicone might not have fully cured for over a year. Ecodur has no limit on applied thicknesses.
The applicator injected 20 milliliters of a foaming agent per 50 lb kit to help ensure an overall even coating of foamed Ecodur which contained crushed polyethylene to help give it extra robustness.
Because of the heat, the applicators had to work fast as pot life was down to about 20 minutes whereas in cooler conditions, they can get 40 minutes before Ecodur solidifies.
