In September, we asked for your questions on exposed-fastened (EF) roofing. Thank you for your responses! We collected them and thought we’d answer one of your questions today. A reader asked us why it made sense to install snow stops on an EF metal roof. If your building is in a snowy climate, installing a continuous snow fence, or discontinuous snow stops or snow guards is essential. For your system to be effective, however, the installation must be well-designed and by calculation – not by “guess and by golly.” There are common misconceptions around snow and metal roofing. So, today we’ll cover why a qualified snow retention system properly engineered for your specific installation is important to EF roofing in heavy-snow regions.

Recently, we had a contractor using our on-line snow retention calculator ask this question.  He had done a number of planning calculations to customize applications of our ColorGard® system for a particular project, and noticed the field for “Safety Factor” on our load information table and also the calculator. What is this?  And what does it do? He wanted to know.

Upon reading the Solar Power World article Metal Roofs are No Problem for Solar Installations, my reaction was, "Well, I suppose that is true—if (and only if) it is done 'the right way.'" There are so many materials, profiles, gauges, metallurgies and corrosion behaviors to consider; not to mention effective waterproofing methods, sealant chemistries, thermal cycling characteristics, weathering behaviors, strength of materials, structural engineering principals and relevant test methods. It is anything but a simple science!