With a hot season averaging nearly 4 months per year, air conditioning is a must in Albuquerque. With the popularity of Pueblo or Santa Fe style architecture in New Mexico, many houses have flat roofs which become ideal homes for HVAC units and ducting. While this is great for maximizing ground usage and property aesthetics, it does pose additional concerns when it is time to reroof or rejuvenate an existing membrane.
Problem
Sealed in a reflective coating to protect against air leaks and maintain peak efficiency, the HVAC ducting on this Albuquerque home no longer had any visible seams and was impossible to move without destroying.
Replacing and sealing all of the ducting would place the cost of a reroof out of the homeowner’s budget. Reroofing would also create a large mess in the home below.
Solution
Because Ecodur is fluid applied, it can be used to create a monolithic membrane around ducting, skylights, and other obstacles commonly found on a roof. By adding thickeners, it can be applied at any depth to seal transitions, gaps, and penetrations. Because Ecodur is waterproof and UV stable, it can withstand the long summers followed by months of monsoons.
Application Results
By removing all gravel and smoothing the remaining surfaces, the crew of Castagra Certified Applicators at SunRise Roofing set themselves up to maximize coverage rates. While Ecodur can be applied over embedded gravel, it can be more cost-effective and yield a more pleasing result to better prepare the substrate.
With a clean, level surface, the crew first used thickened Ecodur to seal all of the penetrations, HVAC cutouts, skylights, and perimeter. With oversized tie-ins in place, the crew used notched squeegees and rollers to coat the field to a consistent 30+ mils.
Thrilled to have their air conditioning uninterrupted throughout the project, the homeowner will now enjoy decades of leak-free, low-maintenance performance with Castagra’s super-tough Ecodur roof coating.
