Recently, the MRCA (Midwest Roofing Contractors Association) issued a warning bulletin regarding TPO roof failures caused by sun’s UV. You can read more about it on our original TPO Roofing page, as well as my commentary to this bulletin.

At the same time, major roofing distributors are shamelessly pushing TPO into the market and onto roofing contractors without much regard for home and building owners. And bear in mind, because of low prices and “same cool roof” and “welded seams” qualities as PVC roofing has, TPO roofing is now the fastest growing commercial roofing product.

Here is a good example – pictures below will show you “manufacturer’s” stand showing TPO roof designed for residential roofing contractors.

Why residential roofing contractors? Well, the way I was told, these are the roofers who can’t afford to spend $12,000 on hot-air welding equipment, so the roof manufacturer created a system so these guys too could jump on TPO band-wagon.

(The TPO stand above, is displaying outside corner flashing, inside corner flashing, pipe boot, and drip-edge details. When I asked about the caulking along the seams, i was told it’s not caulking. It’s seam tape )

Here comes the best part! This TPO roof system is put together with … no, not hot air. Seams are primed and a seam tape is used to seal overlaps! But, it gets better – since there is no uncured flashing material in TPO world, and these “shingle-bangers” don’t have Liesters (hot air welders) nor do they want to buy them, since cheapest one – hand welder – is $450 before tax. So, this manufacturer uses white EPDM uncured flashing for all detail work such as inside / outside corners, posts, curbs (skylights, chimneys, roof hatches, HVAC equipment, etc.). EPDM rubber on TPO – really?

So basically, here is what you – the roof owner get: Untrained, inexperienced roofing contractor, installing a roof system (TPO roofing) which is unproven and there is a good chance it will fail, using flashing materials made for a different roofing system (EPDM rubber roof). And you loose the only real potential benefit of TPO roof – hot-air welded seams, since now all your seams are glued together, just like rubber.

So I want to know who wins? The manufacturers, the distributors, and partially the roofing contractors – but not the homeowner. Why? Manufacturer sells the membrane and accessories, while does not warranty the product since the contractor putting it down, in not trained / certified. Distributors will always get their cut, and contractors who screw up their work, usually disappear. So you, the roof owner will be left to pick up the slack on repairs – kind of sad I think…

Excerpt from TPO roofing discussion at Roofing.com forum:

The post bellow, is my reaction to recent discussions at Roofing.com – one about Pictures of failing TPO roofs, and another one, which started as a homeowner’s question about IB roof, and turned into a discussion about TPO vs PVC roofing.

If you do not feel like reading the two Roofing.com posts linked above, I will mention that Donl is a site admin at Roofing.com and Cerberus is a very knowledgeable (in my opinion) roofing consultant from Texas, and is an active participant in Roofing.com discussions.

The reason why I’m posting my response here – well, I feel that putting it on my blog instead of at Roofing.com will benefit you much more. There, only interested roofing contractors will read it and then, the post will disappear in a week or so.

To Cerberus and Donl:

Guys, I respect your knowledge and experience, of which you have more than I do. At the same time, it seems strange to me that you both defend TPO so actively – here is why:

Putting IB Roofs aside, I do believe that TPO is a bad product (here in US). But besides that notion I have to say that although these pictures ( http://home-and-garden.webshots.com/album/559881410NjElbu ) are from ’97 and the membrane was made around 1990, what has changed?

Also, it should be noted the sheets some are showing as failed TPO are from the early years of TPO roofing before there were ASTM testing criteria. Things have changed, so someone showing a failed TPO membrane from the 1990′s is like me showing a failed Carlisle EPDM roof from back when they were using N-100 Lap Adhesive instead of EP-95 or Seam Tapes; it is deceptive!

Cerberus – when you point out that it was one of the original TPO membranes that failed, do you really know what we as industry are dealing with now?

Do you know what exactly is sold at a local Bradco or ABC? Which formulation it is and how long it will last? Not a single TPO manufacturer will tell you what you are buying – they will never admit that they have a problem, unless it is a HUGE f-up.

Can you possibly know when this TPO will fail or will it last 15-20-25 years. No, you can’t know that, judging from what the TPO manufacturers are doing, which is changing the formulation every few years. And why? Is it because the previous formulation failed? And maybe to put even more fillers in the product to make it cheaper?

As much as I don’t like EPDM rubber roofing, as a flat roofing product, at least with it you know what you are dealing with: Membrane won’t fail. It will be the seams that will start leaking. So you can plan accordingly.

With TPO, you have:

- premature curing
- seam failures
- loss of thickness
- and now we find out that “some” TPO’s can’t take the UV

Yes, TPO is taking over commercial roofing market, and as you Cerberus rightfully pointed out – merely because of its low price and Cool Roof / Welded seams features…

Don’t know about you, but I won’t touch TPO just because I can’t put my name on it.

Do understand that I’d love to work with it – it costs much less than IB and I can get it locally. And because it’s cheaper, it would be MUCH easier for me to sell it! Instead I have to fight the competition which sells both rubber and TPO for much less than I can.

But what do I do when it fails, or the seams come apart, or the water separates the sheet through wicking scrim?

I go with a product that I personally can trust – not something that seems good on paper and is cheaper and easier shove onto customer.

And tell me this Cerberus. When I was asking people on this forum for good pictures of failing TPO roofs, you asked me: ” “Why? What are you trying to do?”

Well, I feel and know that TPO roofs are failing (some are here in Boston, and I can’t talk about it) but manufacturers won’t let people talk about it and specifiers cant say that – yes, TPO roofs are failing – because they already specified 1000s of squares. And roofing contractors won’t talk… and now one can say names. And I would probably also keep my mouth shut if I had a lot to loose .. fortunately I don’t work with TPO … And when I work with PVC, I know that it does work. I repaired an old IB (7 yrs. old) and it welded just fine. I repaired old Sarnifil (20+ yrs. old) with IB and it welded almost just fine. I even repaired a cracked Trocal (about 25+ yrs. old) roof with IB and after cleaning off the dirt, it welded just fine. So yea, plasticizers may leech out, membrane me shatter (and actually does when it’s Trocal ) and so on and so forth, but PVC works!

So what I was trying to do is to get information / evidence (pictures) of PVC and TPO roofs that are failing.

And you know what – in the end, it will come out. Or manufacturers will bite the bullet, quietly replace failed roofs and finally get the formula right (by not removing the components that make the system work)… but they will make less money…

Just my opinion…

Additional materials about PVC and TPO roofing:  TPO Roof failures.

TPO vs. PVC conversation – continued on Feb. 23, 2010

Quoted text is the response from Cerberus posted 0n Feb. 22, 2010:

And while you addressed your post to both myself and Donl, you seem to actually be directing the post at me. So, here it is in a nutshell.

1st – I’m not totally 100% comfortable with TPO yet, but that is because as a consultant I like something with a long successful track record. I know that TPO roofing is in its infancy, and like EPDM, Mod Bit, and yes, even PVC, systems in their infancy tend to have problems that need to be ironed out. In the meantime, as a specifier I am required by local codes to specify a roof with 70+% reflectivity and .70+ emissivity. In other words, I can choose between TPO and Derbibrite since PVC membrane isn’t popular in Houston.

2nd – If I was going to use a PVC roof, it would only be Sarnafil. However, now that it is Sika-Sarnafil how do we know they won’t play with the formulation? You asked me that question about TPO, so I am turning it around on you. Afterall, the first thing Firestone did when they purchased Rhoflex mod. bit. was change the formulation and make it cheaper in both quality and price.

I did address both you and Donl. Its just that Donl did not really defend TPO – more like bashed IB 

Anyway, one by one:

Am I starting a witch hunt? NO! … I know of enough TPO failures and some big ones here in New England, but I’m not at liberty to disclose them and can’t compromise my sources.

I really don’t care that much for TPO – I understand that people want to save money and will 99% of the time go with a cheap option – not quality. This is especially true in commercial market, which you (Cerberus) represent. In residential roofing things are different and TPO guys don’t know how to market to homeowners – therefore I don’t care much about TPO unless we are bidding on the same, usually commercial roof.

My problem with TPO is fundamental – until manufacturers stop “scamming” their customers (roof owners and contractors) by putting out crap products, I will have a problem with TPO. When they make TPO a good product, I will like it, but it won’t be as comparative, and PVC will kick its butt Pictures I needed as visual content.

Now about specifying practices: Basically from your last post I conclude that you will specify a roof that you are “not totally 100% comfortable with TPO yet” because local codes requires roof to be 70% cool and people are not willing to pay premium for PVC.

Also you as a roofing consultant know more than most people here do, and certainly much more than your “customers” – that’s why they hire you. I don’t understand why you would “withhold” information about TPO from your customers? Both Good and Bad.

Why did I use term “withhold”? If you told them about high risk potential of their TPO roof failing withing 7-10 years, they would not buy it. Therefore, I assume you do not enlighten your customers.

I want to stress the point that recent MRCA advisory about TPO roof failures concerns mainly the southern US – your territory with high temps and constant UV exposure.

Bottom line – TPO gets specified because it’s cheap – not because its good, and at the expense of building owners.

I don’t specify mod. bit., TPO, BUR, or any one roof for every building, and I certainly hope you aren’t only selling PVC for your low-sloped roofs. To do so either shows you are limited by the manufacturer’s approvals you can get, or lack of knowledge about other types of roofs.

Maybe I do lack both knowledge or manufacturer’s approvals 

You know – I can buy pretty much any roof I want – TPO / PVC / EPDM or even mod. bit. without manufacturer’s approvals. I won’t. I won’t install rubber because it will leak (not right away of course, but still). I won’t install Mod. Bit. … well I never did and don’t want to learn because in my opinion it’s inferior – those seams will separate and roof will once again leak TPO I just don’t trust. So that leaves PVC which I’m very comfortable with and, since we do not do skyscrapers, it fits our needs 99% of the time. Only once we had a roof for which PVC would not work, but the customer was not willing to pay $2000/sq of Soprema liquid-applied (not coating) – He wanted Rubber for $450/sq. Well I think that’s what he got .

So yes – most of the time I will prescribe PVC.

Term “green” has become very popular during last decade and consequently overused, misused and abused. Anything and everything can be called green today, and to make money and to attract environmentally-conscious customers, people will call themselves and their products green, even when it is just a blatant lie to confuse uneducated consumers. Being a roofing contractor, I will concentrate on roofing products and services. For example, many asphalt shingles manufacturers now offer “cool” and “green”  shingle products – to me it’s just a shameless tactics to sell same NOT-green crap  that is painted different color (usually some shade of white). Excuse me, but asphalts shingles are not green, period! The are made with asphalt, can’t be recycled and end up in landfills in 10-15 years.

Since term green is very vague and can be interpreted in many ways, I’ll offer my vision of “green” – green roofing contractor to be exact, which describes the way I think and try to operate our roofing business. I want to mention that when I say “green roofing contractor”, it has nothing to do with with a roofing contractor installing green roofs or roof-top gardens. To me a contractor installing roof-top vegetation is a highly-specialize landscaping company, but not a roofing contractor (unless they also install the actual flat roofing membrane to waterproof the building).


Quick navigation in this article:
What is a “green” roofing contractor and how one is different from regular roofing companies.
Learn about green benefits of Metal Roofing and IB Flat Roof

What is a “green” roofing contractor?

In my mind a green roofing contractor is a company that work hard to help protect environment and reduce its energy consumption and green-house gas production or carbon footprint. Sure, almost any company will have a carbon-footprint as it’s nearly impossible to be carbon-neutral, but here are many ways to achieve a much lower carbon footprint.

Here are some thing we do to make our overall operation as green as we can, all-the-while saving you, our customers, money on roof installation services, by cutting our internal costs:

First of all, we install cool roofing products, such as IB Cool Flat roofs and Metal roofing systems (usually made from about 90% recycled metal).We also try to do this in the most efficient manner possible to reduce waste, conserve resources and reduce our clients’ energy use for cooling of their home or place of business, as a result if installing our cool roofs.

What makes us a green roofing company?

Besides installing  cool and green roofing products, we strive to be green in operating our business. When it comes to estimating a roof, most roofing contractors will go to numerous roofing estimates, many of which they will not sell. Keep in mind that many home owners get as many as 5-10 estimates before they make up their mind and some roofers need to make two trips if they forgot to measure something.

We work differently: to save our time and most importantly, the energy (gasoline) it takes to drive around to hundreds, and the associated pollution, we created a system of making our estimating process as efficient as possible. This benefits everyone, and you – our customers in the first place.

Here is how our “green” roofing estimate process works:

1. When client you (homeowner or small business), contact us by email or on the phone, we collect as much information about your roof as possible. The information which we collect includes:




• Type of your roof including all roof penetrations and other specific details.
• Dimensions of your home.
• Photographs of your house and/or roof. (If pictures are unavailable for some reason, we will use Google Maps’ “street view” and Bing Maps’ “birds view” to get an idea of what your roof is like)
• Number of layers of the existing roofing materials.
• Roof age.
• Whether your roof leaks or not.
• When you plan to replace the roof.
• Any other roof related information, as well as answer as many of your questions as we can.
2. Based on the information we get from you, we assess your roof’s condition, estimate approximate cost of replacement, as well as suggest the most cost-effective solution for you, as well as address ventilation, insulation, ponding water, drainage and other roof-related issues.
3. Once we complete our analysis, we provide you with a “preliminary roofing price quote” which in our experience is about 95% accurate and may/will usually change if A) roof dimensions were provided incorrectly or B) there are more roofing layers that we were informed of and C) any other unforeseen situations, which actually rarely happen (One such situation happened when we were replacing a rubber roof in Boston, MA – there we removed old parapet cap, and found that 4 layers of brick parapet wall were sitting in completely washed out mortar. Therefore we had to rebuild the parapet wall completely, so that we could actually complete the roof installation properly).
4. Once you get our roofing price quote, you decide whether it is within your budget, and whether you want to proceed with the roof replacement and work with us. At this point many customers will ask us about our references, which we will email to you.
5. If you like our products / company / price, and want to proceed, we schedule a mutually convenient time for a Roof Inspection / Estimate, during which we actually measure your roof to make sure our quote was correct, check how many layers your roof has, make sure there will be now unforeseen situations. We also show you the product, and how it works as well as answer any questions you may have. Once we are done inspecting your roof, we give you the final roof price, which may or may not include any extra work, such as new gutters installation  or something else. Besides the extra work, our final price is 95% of the time, the same as the preliminary price quote.

What is so special about the way we estimate roofs?

The process I’ve described above, eliminates 70% of unnecessary “driving-around”, which not only helps the environment, but also saves you – our customers money! Since most roofing contractors provide seemingly “free roof estimates”, while still spending time on gas / expenses, and using their time to drive around estimating roofs, the customers that actually do sign up to work with such contractors, end up paying for all previously unsold roofing estimates. We do it differently – we give you all the information we can, including our pricing, so there are no surprises. When you have this info, you can decide if you want to work with us. To avoid charging our customers for someone-else’ unsold estimate, we implemented a $99 estimate fee, which is included in the price of the roof if you decide to work with us (it is not an extra charge). This way you only “pay” for your own estimate, and only if after the estimate you decided that for some reason you do not want to work with us. If we sign a contract – you do not pay the $99 fee. Bottom line – you, our customers don’t pay for other people who “wasted” our time, as is the case with most other roofing contractors.

When we actually go on the estimate, we also as if you have an appropriate ladder at your house, so we could access your roof. If you do not have appropriate ladder or roof access, we will bring a truck with all needed ladders. But if you do have a ladder we’d rather take a “car” instead of the truck. This may sound “cheesy” of us, but here is why we do it:

To be more green, we purchased a Toyota Prius – arguably the greenest and most fuel efficient  production car in US. The sole purpose of getting it was so that we can use it for estimating roofs. Its roomy enough to hold all the needed samples and small hand tools (such as the Hand welder for IB Roof seam welding demonstration), and can also hold additional materials for when your roof needs urgent repair work, which we can perform after the roof inspection / estimate.

Toyota Prius – Green Roofing Contractor’s estimating vehicle.

We would rather take the Prius to an estimate because we usually have to drive long distances, as our roofing jobs take place all over southern New England – we install roofs in Massachusetts, and as far west as NY borders of Western Mass. and Connecticut. Prius will save a lot of gas when we have to drive this far, and as a result a lot of pollution. And no, we do not do it to merely save a couple of bucks on gas – it will take us about 300,000 miles to break even at current gas prices ($2.59 / gallon of unleaded gas here in Massachusetts), if we compare cost of new Prius vs. new Corolla / Civic.

In the end, the way we perform our roofing estimates, benefits you (financially, as we do not need to up-charge you for costs of doing “free estimates”), us – also financially and time-wise, and the environment. This shows just one of the ways we are trying to be the “greener” roofing contractor.

Another way which makes us a greener roofing contractor is our product line of Cool Roofing products which last a VERY long time without leaks and are mostly recyclable and are often made from recycled materials. These products include IB Cool Flat Roofing membrane for flat roofs, Recycled (or new) Roofing Insulation, and different types of metal roofing materials, which often consist of more than 50% of recycled metals.

In some cases we will also recommend that you do not tear off your existing roof (this only applies to 1 layer of existing roofing materials), which will reduce land-fill waste and your costs of roof  removal and disposal. Look forward to our future article on when you should and should not tear off your old roof.

Green benefits of Cool Flat Roofing products – IB Roofs:

IB roofs’ cool white surface reflects up-to 95% of solar heat, and dramatically reduce cooling costs in the summer, and with additional thermal insulation, winter heating costs are also reduced by as much as 25-30%.

IB PVC roofing is long-lasting – you can expect your IB roof to last 30+ years without any repairs (unless there is a physical damage) while average flat roof, such as EPDM Rubber roof or tar and gravel roof, lasts 10-15 years.  Long on-the-roof service life means that you would replace your non-IB roof at least once or twice before IB roof even begins to leak. Beside enormous, non biodegradable or recyclable waste going to landfills, there is also huge amount of energy involved in installation of a new roof:

From roofing crews, each driving their F-250 or Dodge Ram to work each day, to heavy equipment delivering materials to job-site and diesel-hungry dumpster trucks going back and forth from job site to landfill, hauling the waste roofing materials.

IB Roofs are thinner and lighter than any asphalt-based product, and each roll of IB 50-mil membrane has 500 sq. ft. coverage. Therefore, for an average residential flat roof installation  we need only one trip of a fully loaded work truck or van to bring all materials, tools and 3 roofers to a job site. And we don’t need to bring a crane or haul a tar kettle around.

If you have an new hot tar or asphalt roof put on, also think about all the energy going to heat up that tar or asphalt to the point of boiling. For a torch-down modified bitumen roof, think of all the propane gas being burned to melt each square foot of that roof.

Simply by switching to cool flat roof products, a roofing contractor can in time, reduce their carbon footprint by almost 50%, increase profits, production, have happier and healthier employees (just imagine breathing in tar dust or hot asphalt fumes each day), and help protect the environment overall.

Installation video of Cool, White IB roof – hot air welding:

Green benefits of Metal Roofing:

Metal roofing is the longest lasting roofing material for sloped roofs. Some copper roofs in Europe have lasted more than 5 centuries. Metal roofs are readily made with more than 50% of recycled metals content, and will outlast ANY asphalt shingles roof by at least 3 time (when installed properly), and often will last well beyond its warranty periods.This will significantly reduce the asphalt shingles waste that goes to the landfills every 10 to 15 years, when your roof starts to leak and needs to be replaced.

Metal roofs like IB flat roofs are Cool, Energy Star compliant roofs, and will reflect significant amount of solar heat, as well as minimize heat transfer into your house. Reflectivity of metal roofs depends on the color (lighter colors will be more reflective) and the paint or coating used in manufacturing of a given metal roofing systems. The de-facto coating used in metal roofing is Kynar 500 paint and any of its variations / modifications by third-party manufacturers. These paints have in them cool roof reflective pigments, and will usually qualify of $1500 federal tax credit for energy efficient home improvements.

If your metal roof was installed incorrectly or is way past its warranty period and starts to rust / leak (only steel roofs can rust, as other metals used in metal roofing are usually rust-proof, except for corrosion caused by mixing of different metals, such as copper and aluminum). This old metal roofing materials can be recycled, and there and numerous metal recycling facilities around, where contractors bring old metals.

When we replaced old metal  roofs on IHOP restaurants (which were in part incorrectly installed over 35 years ago) in Hyannis, MA and Brighton, MA, we recycled every single piece of each of those roofs, including clips and nails used to hold them down. For more information, read or article on pros and cons of metal roofing.

Installation video of Standing Seam Cool Metal Roof:

Why hire green roofing contractors?

Basically, when you are dealing with a green roofing company, you can usually expect to work with caring and responsible people, who charge a little extra for their products and services, but will give you a lot more than your neighborhood roofer from yellow pages. It is almost a given that level of workmanship and quality of roofing products will be above and beyond than most roofing contractors. And of course the green roofing contractors will use earth-friendly products and will run their operations in a green way, which will benefit the environment. You don’t have to believe in global worming to agree that using green products and conserving energy / resources is a good thing.

If you live or own a business in Massachusetts, Connecticut or Rhode Island and need a new roof – let us know and we will give you some of the best deals around. Fill out our roof estimate form and we will help you get a “greener roof” and we promise to be gentle with mother earth!

You may use our roofing calculator to estimate the cost of your roof replacement, find out your potential energy savings (in dollars) and compare the prices of IB Roof to “not cool” EPDM rubber and Modified Bitumen (torch-down) roofs.

So is your roofing contractor green?

Replacing old rubber roof with IB PVC roofing membrane in Lowell, MA.

In the beginning of Dec. 09 we installed a new IB PVC roof in Lowell, MA. This roof replaced an old EPDM rubber roof which was installed by a hack roofing contractor about two years ago, and was failing miserably, due to two factors: poor roofing system design on the part of EPDM roofing and horrible installation by the roofing contractor, who as I suspect had almost zero knowledge about flat roofing and rubber installation. Before I go into the IB roof installation, I wanted to talk a bit about the two above-mentioned factors contributing to rubber roof failure.

The roof actually consisted of two roof sections not connected to each other. One smaller roof in the front of this historic home, was about 100 sq. ft. in total, but its shape made using a rubber roof not feasible due to limitations / flaws of rubber roof system design. Another roof section was just over 300 sq. ft. and covered enclosed porch in the rear of the house. This section had a low slope to it (about 2 in 12 pitch) and a hip roof design. The failure of both front and rear roof sections was a result of bad installation by the roofing contractor and EPDM rubber roof shrinkage as well as seam adhesive failure.

Rubber roof failure due to EPDM flaws and limitations and faulty installation my roofing contractor:

When EPDM rubber roofing membrane is installed on a roof connected to a wall of a building, the membrane must be laid down with a flap going up the wall – in essence, the wall flashing and the roof covering must be done with one piece of material to eliminate leaks the the roof to wall connection. therefore the field sheet of roofing membrane is only held down by glue (which happens to break down after 5-7 years). While in some cases this work out fine, very often the rubber shrinks and pulls away from the wall-to-roof connection point. This results in ether detachment of wall flashing, membrane pulling away from the corner of roof to wall connection, or in some rare cases, when wall flashing is securely attached to the wall, the shrinking rubber roof may pull the wall with it – for example it can pull a brick parapet wall.

IB PVC roof is installed differently. All membrane is terminated at the roof to wall connection with heavy duty fasteners (screws r masonry anchors) and barbed plates, to hold the membrane down. A separate wall flashing is installed up the wall and 5-6″ away from the wall, covering the screws and plates, and is welded to the roof, making the wall flashing watertight. The wall flashing is attached to the wall using either an aluminum termination bar, or nailed to the wall in cases when it will later be covered by siding.

At the edges of the roof, a PVC coated drip edge is installed into pressure-treated (PT) wood nailer, using roofing screws to securely attach it to the roof deck, and to prevent wind uplift. Then the IB PVC roofing membrane sis welded to the drip edge. In case of rubber roof, the drip-edge is nailed down with smooth-shank roofing nails. This makes pull-out very easy – strong wing can pull the rubber roof off, or as in this case, the rubber shrinkage pulled the whole assembly away from the roof edge. In rare cases, rubber roofing contractor will use the roofing screws to attache the drip edge. Most of the time, roofing contractor will install drip edge right over soft insulation, with 2 or 3′ roofing nails. You can easily pull off this drip edge by hand, even if its nailed 6″ o.c., as we did on this roof.

IB flat roof installation:

Roof Insulation: The homeowners who just purchased their Lowell, MA home recently, wanted to improve insulation over the back porch, while the front roof was already insulated between the rafters. We used 24–r value, 4-inch Poly ISO insulation board on the back roof and 1/2 inch fan-fold insulation in the front. The design of the rear roof section and the short distance between the two rear windows and the roof, made us use tapered insulation to actually reduce the thickness of ISO board from 4″ to 2″ at roof to wall connection. This allowed us to properly flash the roof to the wall, though gradually reducing insulating value from 24-r down to 12-r at the wall.

Roof tear-off: To keep installation costs and land-fill waste down, while installing the roof in accordance with MA building code (which allows no more than two layers of roofing material, unless approved by structural engineer and building inspector), we removed one layer of rubber roof and the fiber board, leaving old tin roof on the front roof and rolled asphalt on the rear roof in place.

Day one – installation of smaller front roof.

First thing we had to do on the first day was to get a roofing permit from Lowell building department. Since homeowners just recently bought their house, the building department did not catch up with the assessor’s office on current owners of the property (and why would day do any extra work if they don’t get paid for it?),so it took us some time to square things out.After we got the building permit, it was placed in the appropriate spot – front window of the house. Now it was time to get to work.

The roof was installed between to snow-storm – one right after Thanksgiving and another one just a few days later. On the first day we had to shovel all the snow off the front and rear roof, and removed the rubber membrane off the front roof. We decided to leave the rubber on the rear roof until we actually had time to get to it, since it was supposed to snow and rain the day after.

Once the rubber roof was removed, we installed the perimeter wood nailer and laid down the insulation. We then installed the drip edge and sheets of IP PVC roofing membrane, which were pre-cut on the ground, to simplify installation on this already tight roof. IB membrane was welded to the PVC coated drip edge and mechanically fastened down to the roof deck with heavy duty screw and plate in-filed and along the roof to wall connection.

Roof to wall flashing: A separate roof to wall flashing was installed, and welded to the roof, and nailed to the wall and attached with aluminum termination bar along the exposed wall. Inside and outside corners were flashed with IB non-reinforced corner flashing material. which was welded to the roofing membrane.

At the end, an IB 5″ two-way air-vent was installed remove the condensation between the roofing membrane and insulation. In, installation of roof to wall flashing took as lone as the rest of roof installation. Since the roof to wall flashing was the main part of rubber roof failure and the most difficult part of this installation, we had to spend extra time, making sure this one will last a lifetime.

Day two – installation of the rear roof.

Rubber roof tear-off, insulation and IB membrane  installation all had to done in one day, so the roof would be watertight after we left job site for the night. We left all finish and detail work for last day – our main goal was to have the roof covered at the end of work day. Fortunately for us, the rubber roof came off very easily, as the glue barely held it, and drip edge was popping of like popcorn. We also removed the old fiber-board, to maximize the clearance between the window sills and the roof.

Once old rubber roof was removed, we started laying out our 4 inch high wood nailer along roof’s perimeter. We used double 2×6 PT boards with 1/2 inch strips of PT plywood in the middle – this gave us almost 4″ total thickness, to match the thickness of ISO insulation. When the wood nailer was installed, we laid down the double 2″ insulation boards along the outer perimeter of the roof. At this point we had to start the tapered insulation. We first laid down 1″ ISO board and then double sheets of 1/4″ per foot tapered ISO, to bring the total insulation thickness from 4″ to 2″ over 4 feet distance.

Once all insulation was laid out, and fastened down according to FM Global insulation fastening standards (8 fasteners per 4×8 sheet of insulation), we installed the pre-cut rolls of IB membrane, which was fastened down 12″ O.C.

First we installed a perimeter half-sheet roll, and then a full width roll, butting it against the wall. Now it was time for roof to wall flashing and termination. Our roof to wall flashing was made out of 3 pieces of 2 feet wide IB membrane to have appropriate up-the-wall flashing. After roof to wall flashing was installed and all seams welded, we installed two outside corner flashing. Now the roof was watertight, it was already dark, and time to go home.

Day three – installation of drip-edge, cover tape and cedar clapboard siding.

On the last day we installed the special order 5″ wide face drip edge which was installed over the IB membrane, and a 6″ IB cover tape was welded down to the drip edge and the roof. All joints between the 10 foot sections of the drip-edge sealed according to IB installation spec to prevent roof damage from expansion and contraction of the metal. A 2″ foil-tape was placed over the joint and a 5″ IB flashing material was welded on top. We also replaced the old cedar clapboard siding which was rotted and fell apart after we removed it to install the roof to wall flashing. Although it does not seem like a lot of work, it actually to us entire day to complete. As the last finishing touch, a 5″ two-way membrane vent was installed in the center of the roof.

Information for homeowners regarding flat roofs:

Words of caution  we strongly recommend home and building owners to avoid installing EPDM rubber roofing membrane. Besides the faulty design of this roof, there are too many shady contractors, with little or no experience, who can buy rubber roofing material at almost any roofing supply warehouse. You may be attracted to seemingly low price of EPDM rubber roofs, but be aware that low price comes with VERY low quality of workmanship, and to compensate for low prices, these contractors will use cheap rubber glue and accessories.

When you choose to go with a quality flat roofing product like IB Flat Roofs and a professional contractor, you will not be paying twice for a new flat roof and dealing wit roof leaks and finding your rubber roof installer to fix the leaks, like the one bellow:

Leaking rubber roof in Quincy, MA, installed directly over asphalt shingles:

Look at the picture above – it is a 1 year old EPDM rubber that was installed by a shady “rubber roofing specialist” contractor, who disappeared, and does not return home owner’s phone calls. They glued the rubber membrane straight to asphalt shingles roof, which you can see “telegraphing through the rubber. This roof has leaking ever since it was installed. Read more information about rubber roof materials, roofing contractors and their training in installation of rubber roofs (or lack of such training) in our rubber roofing guide for flat roof owners.

If you have a leaking rubber roof in Metro Boston area of Massachusetts, and can’t afford to replace it now with IB PVC roof, we can repair you EPDM rubber roof with high quality EPDM peel-and-stick flashing accessories - MA rubber roofing repair services start at $350 and include 2 hours of repair work, and necessary materials to complete the repair. Fill out the rubber roof repair request form to schedule a a professional roof mechanic to come and fix your commercial or residential EPDM rubber roof.

Getting IB roof installed on you flat roof in Massachusetts:

If you have a flat roof in Lowell, MA, or and other city in Massachusetts, we can install and IB PVC flat roofing membrane on the roof of your home or business – fill out our roofing estimate and price quote request form and don’t forget to use our roofing price calculator to estimate your roof replacement costs, and compare prices to EPDM rubber and Tar and Gravel roofing.

Massachusetts is our home state and here is where we install majority of our roofs (with Connecticut being in second place). In Massachusetts, roofing market is very different, depending on location, and although there are a lot more sloped roofs, not only in Mass., but in the rest of the country, we still install more Flat roofs than Metal roofs. As for geographic location of your home in Massachusetts, up north, toward the New Hampshire border, roofs are more prone to Ice Dam roof leaks and damages than houses located in the southern MA.

Although Massachusetts is not a very big state, the your location can have a dramatic effect on the amount of snow fall in the winter, and thus your chances of having Ice dams and and related roof leaks. For example on the same day, an average roof in Sharon or Norwood will have 1-2 inches of ice alone the eaves, whereas an average roof in Lowell will have 5+ inches of ice build-up. If you go further north of south away from Boston the amount of annual snow accumulation and ice dams will increase or decrease respectively.

Why do I mention Ice dams and roof leaks in the intorductory part? It’s simple – most commercial roofs are flat, and are not prone to ice dams, though they have their own list of problems that I will discuss bellow. Residential roofs on the other hand are the ones mostly affected by ice dams. These are both sloped roofs and low-slope / flat roof, and we have the best and longest lasting solutions for both - Metal Roofing for sloped roofs and IB Roof for low slope flat roofs, such as shed dormer roofs, and completely flat roofs.

Bellow we will give you a quick overview of most recent and some older roof installations that we’ve completed in Mass. Keep in mind that these are not the complete job profiles. Complete job overviews will be posted separately, as time permits us to write them. In the overviews bellow I will provide basic information about each roof, accompanied by a few pictures and short description of roof installation process and challenges we had to face.

Before we go into job reviews, here are a few additional articles you may find useful, when choosing a roof product for your home and a roofing contractor to install it:

How to prevent Ice Dams – comprehensive guide on which focuses on the root cause of Ice dams which is usually a combination of poor ventilation and and inadequate insulation in the attic space or between roof rafters. This guide will help homeowners minimize heat leaks in the attic, improve ventilation and eliminate the effects of ice dam leaks by installing a Metal Roof or an IB low-slope roofing membrane.

Low-slope roofs – Overview of common problems associated with low slope residential roof such as shed dormers or roof on most cape-style homes located in the norther MA. Common issues with such roofs include rotten roof decking / rafters and Ice-dams. Since this roofs are prone to Ice dam leaks, most of the rot damage is an effect of ice dams and although many roofing contractors will insist that using Ice and Water shield will do the trick, our experience shows that most of the time I&W fails to protect the roof even if entire roof deck is covered in Ice and Water. Therefore we believe that best solution for permanent protection of low-slope roofs and eliminating ice dams is the use of metal roof of IB flat roofing membrane in conjunction with solving ventilation/insulation issues described in the article above.

Roofs we installed in Massachusetts:

Low slope shed dormer roof in Westminster, MA

This roof we installed in early May of 2009. The house is located in heavily wooded are of central Mass, just north of mount Wachusett. Westminster, MA is located along Rt. 2, and not very far from New Hampshire border. These areas get major snow falls in the winter, together with colder temperatures than those in Boston and ice dams are a major problem in Westminster, even for high slope roofs. Low slope roofs such as the one we replaced there, are very likely to have ice dam leaks and other problems such as rotten roof deck, wet insulation, and mold.

The roof has been leaking for some time around the chimney in the center of the roof and was patched many times with tar, but rather unsuccessfully. Also, due to Ice Dams and roof leaks caused by ice formation along the roof eaves, the home owner installed heating cables to stop the Ice dam leaks. These however did not help either and after one more unsuccessful roof repair, home owner decided to get an IB roof installed.

The home owner and their cousin who is a roofer in NH, did the roof tear-off and replaced all rotten plywood decking, to reduce the cost of roof installation, while we installed the roof itself, insulation, chimney flashing, ridge vent and snow guards (snow retention system).

Note – even though before we installed IB roof, home owner’s main concern was to get ice and snow off the roof. After IB roof was installed, our concern was that due to roof’s pitch, which was about 3 in 12″, the snow and Ice would just slide off the roof in a large pile, crushing down onto deck and perch bellow it. Also there was a grill on the deck which was not movable since it was tied to a gas line.

The chimney flashing, which may seem to take not to much time, actually took about 6-7 hours to properly flash. The reason ot turned out to be so lime consuming it that it is located in the center and separates the ridge vent as well as creeping onto another side of the roof. Due to its position, size and the way IB roof is installed it not only took long to work around, but also slowed down the rest of roof installation. Because the the ridge vent buts into the chimney, we had to make sure that not only ridge vent is raised an inch off the roof level to prevent the wind-driven rain from leaking into the house, but also that it is completely tied to the roof, and flashed up the chimney. Once the chimney flashing was installed and counter flashing reglet had to bi installed as well.

All in all it took us 3 days to install this roof, though 3rd day was rather short. What really slowed us down, was the first heat wave of that spring and unrealistic number of bugs / flies / mosquitoes in this wooded / swampy area of central Mass.

Roofing membrane used: 50 mil mechanically attached IB PVC flat roofing system.

Insulation used: 1/2″ fan-fold Styrofoam insulation with clear plastic / metal facing.

Total roof square footage: Approximately 500 sq. ft.

Standing seam metal roof in Wayland, MA.

Right after the roof in Westminster was installed, we started getting ready for a big metal roofing project, which used .032 Aluminum standing seam metal roof in 1 3/4″ snap lock profile with 16″ wide pan and stiffening ribs. This roof took about two weeks to install between tear-off of old asphalt shingles, siding removal, replacement of rotten wood replacement, delays with material shipments and wrong type of flashing being delivered.

Actually one of the delays happened because our supplier ran out of Grey aluminum coil after 80 % of roofing panels were rolled out of their mobile standing seam roll-forming machine, which was based in Manchester, NH. As the supplier received more aluminum coil 3 dais later the send a different truck, from New London, CT. As that truck arrived and rolled off the first test panel, just out of curiosity I decided to compare first batch to the second one. It turned out that the machine on the New London truck was set up to be 1/8″ wider than Manchester truck. This, over the course of 23 panels gave us an extra 3″ of panel which converted to two extra panels – 1 1/2″ wide – on either side of the rear roof section and exactly 23 panels on the front. We had to send the truck back and wait for the Manchester, NH truck to deliver and roll out the same coil. Even the guys working for the supplier were not aware if this mismatch between the two machines.

In the end the Manchester truck delivered the right-width panels and we were able to finish the jobs without any more delays. The homeowner – Glenn – was also very concerned with snow and ice falling off the roof and damaging the gutters bellow, so we installed a commercial-grade double rail snow retention system to eliminate the possibility of snow falls form the roof.

We already posted a full review of this roof installation on our blog, a few months back, so if you want to know more details, read the standing seam metal roof in Wayland, MA job profile.

Rubber roof in Boston, MA.

In August of 2009 we’ve completed a rather small, but very tricky and complicated flat roof installation in Boston, on one of the traditional Boston-style homes/buildings, which you can see all alogn Mass. ave, Comm. ave as well as Blue Hills avenue, on which this house is located. It was originally a EPDM rubber roof, which had over 50 percent of seams separated due to adhesive failure. The two-tower wood design made this roof much more difficult to repair and our client – Jim – chose to eliminate the hassles of frequent roof repairs and decided to have an 80-mil IB roof installed.

Although this should have been a pretty much straight-forward roof replacement, with rubber tear-off performed first and a new IB roof installed, I sensed that it will not be an easy job. Until we opened up the roof I could not say for sure what obstacles we’re going to face, but once we did remove the rubber, we found that entire length of the masonry parapet wall was damaged by water and poor quality of brick mortar. We also found that we would have to rebuild the parapet walls much as 4 layers of brick deep.

Because a chose a careful approach to the rubber removal, by only pulling back the rubber membrane off the parapet wall, and not cutting it, we were able to do entire brick repair work and roof preparation, while having the roof watertight each night with original rubber membrane.

Once all brick repair war was complete and mortar had sufficient time to cure, we installed a 2×8 pressure treated perimeter wood nailer to which IB wall flashing and drip edge would be attached. Only on the last day did we remove the whole rubber roof, installed new insulation and laid dawn the new, mechanically attached IB PVC flat roofing membrane.

We had to come back one more time to install the new gutter and downspouts, IB two-way membrane vents and 9″ IB attic vents over specially cut holes in the roof deck. These attic vents were installed to vent out the moisture that accumulated in the small attic space when the old rubber roof was leaking. Once in place these oversize vents will eventually dry out the attic and prevent any future mold growth.

Now Jim can enjoy his watertight roof and get sun baths sitting in his beach chair on the roof of his home, and not worry about damage to membrane – he chose a very durable, commercial grade 80-mil IB roof. He will also enjoy a cooler home, due to IB cool roofing features.

You can read the complete job profile about this Flat roof in Boston, MA on our Cool Roofing Blog.

Flat roof in Framingham, MA

One of the more recent roofs we’ve installed was in Framingham, MA, where we installed an IB roof on yet another shed dormer roof for Ed Kelly – a high-end remodeling contractor out of Northborough, MA. The builder had his crew remove old asphalt shingles off this roof an replace most of the old decking with new 3/4" plywood. We were there to install just the membrane and flash it 2 feet up the sloped roof.

During my conversation with Ed (builder), he told me me why he chose the seemingly more expensive IB roof over a cheaper rubber EPDM membrane. His main reason was the IB’s hot-air welded seams, and hassle free roof performance. Before, Ed would use a rubber roof on a few of his projects, end all but one of them leaked due to problems with seams, and required expensive rubber roof repair. Ed decided to end his flat roofing nightmares and constant rubber roof leaks, and went with IB roof.

The entire job took us one day to complete. The roof was ready to start, as we arrived to the job site in the morning, and before dark we packed our tools and were ready to leave, as the roof was all done. The roofing crew which did the tear off and deck replacement was putting the new asphalt shingles and aluminum fascia trim back on, as we were driving away.

Roofing material: 50 mil white IB roof, mechanically attached.

Insulation: 1/2″ fan-fold Styrofoam.

Total roof size: Approximately 450 sq. ft.

Flat roof deck in Wellesley, MA

Just before the Framingham flat roof job described above, we did another job for Ed – an 80 mil IB roof that would be a water-proofing membrane for a roof deck over a garage being built as an addition to an already huge home in a very secluded area of Wellesley.

Once again, a complete job profile for this roof deck is already on our blog, so there is no point to rewrite it here – read the Wellesley, MA  flat roof deck installation overview.

Solar flat roof in Medford, MA

This job, was actually sponsored by Cool Flat Roof (us) and IB Roof Systems, as it was a non-profit project, competing in the 2009 Solar Decathlon competition, sponsored by the US DOE. We installed an IB roof on a Boston solar home with some help from the project volunteers and Architecture students from BAC and Tufts.

Once again, we have a complete coverage of the installation of the IB flat roof and the Solar PV panels on this roof - Solar roof installation in Boston, MA.

Low slope shed dormer roof in Hingham, MA

Yet another shed dormer roof and also with major ice dams problems and leaks. This roof was just a year old when we removed the old asphalt shingled, and installed a new 50 mil IB traditions roof with asphalt shingles pattern printed onto IB white roofing membrane. This roof was completely covered with Ice & water shield which failed miserably and forced homeowner to climb up the slippery ladder all winter long, sometimes two times a day, to brake off the ace along the roof edge.

Homeowner – Paul – tried everything, from sodium-filled socks above the skylights to heating cables – nothing seemed to help, as with lack of proper ventilation and inherent limitations of asphalt shingles, his roof was still leaking, as it faced north, and sun never shined over it in the winter.

Paul wanted a permanent solution to stop roof leaks and not a single roofing contractor that Paul contacted could explain to him how they would stop the leaks or promise that their roof will work. Some even offered to  install asphalt shingles with Ice & Water shield – Really? Paul already had shingles with Ice and Water and it was not working.

Initially, Paul contacted us about getting a metal roof installed on his house, but after examining the roof, I suggested ti install IB roof instead, and residential flat roofing solution form IB  - Traditions Classic seemed to be the best option as it combined all the benefits of IB roof with the classic look of architectural asphalt shingles printed onto the membrane. After a little decision making, Paul and his wife chose to go with a seamless one piece IB roof. In this case there would be zero possibility of ice dam leaks.

All skylights now have seamless 1-piece plashing whelded to the roof, and the rodge vent is raise by an inch above the roof level to prevent wind driven water from penetrating the roof.

Now that Paul has a new IB Traditions roof, which is in effect a seamless, one piece blanket over entire roof, he and his wife won’t have to worry about roof leak and breaking ice off the roof any more.

With this, we conclude the first part of our Massachusetts job profiles list. We will update it as we have time to add more pictures and descriptions to each job, and will also add complete job profiles for each roof, when we have a chance.

Getting IB roof or a metal roof installed on your home in Massachusetts:

If your roof is leaking or you have Ice dams,and are tired of fighting with the ice, using heat cables, sodium-filled socks, raking your roof, and risking to fall of a ladder, you need to contact the low-slope roofing experts ( us ), request a free roofing price quote and schedule a roof inspection / estimate. You can also use our online roofing calculator to estimate your roof replacement cost and compare the roof prices of IB PVC membrane to Rubber roofing and Modified bitumen / Tar and gravel roofs.

Forewords: If you are a building inspector / official, please try to understand that this rant from contractors point of view… Or at least be objective and unbiased.

Pros and cons of building permits:

Why do we need building inspectors (and do we really need them)? Well, they are supposed to inspect – right? They are there to protect homeowners from shady contractors, and ensure that construction goes in accordance with state / national building codes. That’s why we also have specialty trade inspectors (electrical, plumbing, mechanical, etc). But do they really do their job? Another question – why do we need building permits? Yes, to pay the building inspector for doing his/her job – do the inspections. Yea, right!

I will purposely omit building inspectors in charge of large construction projects such as bridges, sky-scrapers, factories, etc. There is a lot more responsibility there and these inspectors are a lot more knowledgeable  than your average “Joe the building inspector”.

In my being a roofing contractor, I had to pull many permits in the last 6 years – for almost every job we did. In all this time, only once have I seen a building inspector at a job site, and he was there to harass the home-owner about the “illegal kitchen” that came with the house they just purchased. In the beginning of my construction life, I needed to get permits, but did not have sufficient / adequate insurance and in some cases did not have the Home Improvement Contractor registration in a state I was doing work. Luckily for me, I was able to get permits, and because I have dignity (I’d like to think so) I did decent work without code violations and nothing bad ever happened. I once had a “stop job” order posted at a job site, where we forgot to pull a permit. Ahh… the good old days.

When you get into serious contracting like the Metal Roofing and IB Roof installations, you can’t afford not to have proper insurances and licenses. Your clients by default expect everything to be current and you to be fully insured – both worker’s comp and general liability.  And besides, it is easier to show proof of insurance than to explain why you do not have it, or better yet to ask home owner to pull “owners permit”. It is also much easier to get a permit in 5 minutes instead of waiting 3 days and hoping that inspector is not a complete a$$ or is looking for a bribe – for some reason, I have a very strong suspicion that some building inspectors in Lynn, Revere, Malden and other surrounding towns in Massachusetts, purposely jerk contractors around, as if telling them – “give me $300 and you have your permit”. I really believe so. Or they just hate people in general. But let me get back to building inspectors.

My experience with building inspectors and permits:

I will try to be logical here, and present information in chronological order. Here is a work day of a building inspector as I see it:

In 85% of the times I walked into a building department of any city and town, building inspector is not there. Apparently they are out, doing inspections. But as I mentioned before, I had never seen and inspector on my job site, to inspect my roof. If inspector is in the office, he (I will use a “he” as all building inspectors I’ve met, were guys) will make you wait 2-5 minutes before asking you what you need. Apparently they need to feel as if they have power and are in control. After the initial coldness I did get permits, so there is nothing to complain about. But there is. And it is about how I got my permits and why do we actually need to pull them and pay for them. It is my honest belief that permits were instituted as means for towns to raise money, and biased on this assumption I’m more than happy to pay the fee. But any building inspector will tell you that permit is to pay for the inspection and enforcement on the building codes.

So I will tell you a few instances of how I got some of my permits, how horrendous the process can be for a contractor, and why so many contractors, including honest, illegal and shady ones, never pull permits. There is a provision in Mass. Building code that inspector has up to 30 days to issue the permit. We installed a Metal Roof on an IHOP restaurant in Hyannis, MA (down at the Cape Cod). When I vent to pull the permit (which was an hour drive one way) I almost got rejected, as my Worker’s Comp certificate was generic and not made out to Town of Barnstable. Fortunately, my insurance agent faxed in a copy 2 minutes before town hall closed.

As a side note, due to insurance fraud, in MA, your insurance agent cannot really give you an “all purpose” worker’s comp certificate, and the actual insurance company must print one out and mail it to you. This takes at least 3 days. Imagine a regular residential roofing company which installs a roof in one day and works 5 days a week. They have to get worker’s comp certificate for each roof, for every town they work in.

As my insurance certificate came out of fax machine, the office lady called over the building inspector to look at my paperwork (after being there for an hour and a half, he never looked a it). He asked me for HIC registration ONLY, although all commercial work required me having a CSL (construction supervisor license) and HIC implies that i do home improvement. When I offered the inspector my CSL, he said that he did not need it. Neither did he need my general liability insurance. Once he verified what he was looking for, he said: “You are all set – you can start in two weeks.” Why??? Why on earth do I have to wait two weeks??? I can loose a contract in two weeks. “Fortunately” half the roof on the restaurant was blown off by a storm wind, and it was more of an emergency roof work – this was the only reason he “allowed” us to start right away. So why do we need to wait two weeks I still don’t know. Time spent to get the permit – 4.5 hours.

Another time we did a roof in Grafton, MA. An IB low-slope roof on a residential home. Nothing fancy – a pretty straight forward roof. As I applied for the permit, I was told to firs fill out 7 different forms, pay three different departments for some ridiculous things (even the health department) and I also had to submit a SPEC for IB roof installation, including MSDS sheet (why?). They did not expect me to be back for a few days, but I was determined to either get a permit or permission to start work the same day as once again I drove pretty far to make sure every thing is ready for us to start when we planned to. I quickly ran to town library and printed about 20 pages of IB specifications describing exactly the parts of the roof we were going to do (I love IB online Quick Spec writer). When I brought back the whole package, the inspector was so surprised that he gave me an “ok” to start any time. Later, his secretary told me that he will actually read the spec. If I had know, I’d print out 200 pages, of exiting reading material.  Time spent to get the permit – 5 hours.

There are many other stories I can tell about pulling a building permit. I do want to say that not all inspectors are evil. One time we told a building inspector in Abington, MA that we did not have MA HIC – only the one from Rhode Island. He was cool enough to tell us: “get the homeowner to pull the permit”, which we did and all worked out well. I also absolutely love the Boston building department. The flow of contractors there is so heavy that they do not have time for stupid things like full spec for a small residential re-roof. They check your insurances and licenses, collect a fee and give you a permit.

Many towns in MA and CT will give you permission to start and mail you the permit. Some will make you run around as a squirrel. They will want 3 days before you can start a job. So I adopted and “evolved”.  Now I call the building department of any city or town where I’m going to work and tell them that I have a 3 hours drive to just get to their town, and if the could “please let me start the same day I apply for a permit”. This usually worked great. For example, when we installed an IB flat roof in Andover, CT – I never actually met the building inspector in person. I spoke to him on the phone – told him roof leaks and is covered with tarps (which was true) and we need to start ASAP. He gave an ok and all I had to do, was apply for the permit and provide proof of insurance and a construction license.

The second flat roof which we did in the Andover, CT – I still had to talk to him on the phone. This time he wasn’t as happy but since we already came to town, I “begged” him to let us start the job, without looking at it. Once again it was a complete tear-off and pretty straight forward, so he gave us a green light. But from now on, I have to apply for permit by mail and he wants to see my work. Next time I’m in Andover, I’ll give him a call ahead of time. Here you can see the pictures of our second roof in Andover, Connecticut and on of a roof in Westminster , MA: http://www.coolflatroof.com/flat-roofing-blog/low-slope-roofing-on-shed-dormers/

Why you should have a building permit for any construction work:

Bottom line – not all building inspectors are evil. Some are very nice, some are just bored and need things to do, and some need to feel powerful. All depends on your luck. I learned how to coexist with any building inspector, and no do everything in advance – even have my insurance agent fax over my certificates before I arrive at city hall.

Why did I write all this? Well – this is my blog and I can do it! Where else can I talk about it?

What is the point of all of this? I just had to get it out of my system after years of contractor – inspector interaction. Also my friend tried to pull a roofing permit for a VERY simple and straight forward roof – a measly 9 squares  on walkable gable roof in Malden, MA. And the inspector wants to inspect … maybe he had a bad day, but my buddy has to wait a few days until he can start. Really? So this was my inspiration.

Also, I want to make a point that many inspectors let shady contractors with fake certificates slide through or don’t even check for insurance and construction license, all-the-while they make other contractors chase their tails and waste time (and money) as if they have nothing to do. They also harass homeowners and issue stupid fines for stupid violations that should be grandfathered in. This creates situations where homeowners  and contractors knowingly do not pull permits. It also creates risk for homeowners to be left out if a shady contractor does bad job and screws them – without a permit they cannot use the Mass. Homeowner Protection Fund.

Can this be fixed? I don’t see a solution since there are too many hack inspectors and contractors out there and homeowners really need to do their due diligence – check references, call people, look at the jobs, licenses, insurance certificates, etc.

I encourage any homeowner to read my article on how to choose a roofing contractor. You should also know that it is pretty easy to “scam” the building permit process. For example, a roofing contractor must have a full roofing general liability insurance, which can easily cost $10,000+ per year, and worker’s come which runs at about 35-40% of payroll ($35-40 for every $100 you pay your guys). Many contractors will buy a siding insurance for $500-700 per year and use that certificate to pull permits.  The can also claim to be “sole proprietor” on the Worker’s Comp form when they apply for a permit and get away with not having the insurance at all – even if they have employees.

As for licenses – in Rhode Island there is no construction license at all – only a contractor registration. You can do everything with it, except for electrical, plumbing, etc. In Massachusetts, only recently have they implemented a mandatory requirement for CSL to perform roofing, siding and windows work. Before, any hack could get a roofing permit with just and HIC registration.

So once again, always do your due diligence when choosing a contractor.

As for the contractors – have your paperwork ready, do good work and, good luck guys!

PS. I’m not an angel and did not start my roofing business with $20,000 to buy all proper insurance. I did my share of getting around the permitting issue. Every one goes through it, but some remain in that stage forever. As for me – I prefer to do everything the right way or not do it at all.

As I’m writing this, the 2009 Solar Decathlon in Washington, DC is nearing its completion. Twenty teams from around the globe are competing to build the best Solar Home, judged in ten different categories, including: architecture, engineering, net metering, living comfort as well as others. This year, Massachusetts – home to some of the  greatest colleges and universities in the world – is represented by Team Boston - the joined efforts of Tufts, Boston Architecture College and a team of volunteers, all with the common goal to create green and sustainable home designs that could be readily available and affordable for actual home buyers and home builders. You can read my 2009 Solar Decathlon Review with pictures and videos I took there during Columbus Day weekend.

Cool Flat Roofs and IB Roof Systems are proud sponsors of Team Boston’s solar home.  We provided the project with IB flat roofing materials (provided by IB Roof Systems) and a professional installation, as well as last minute roof design changes, and modifications to roof penetration placement and drainage setup.

The Boston solar home construction is all finished, the Solar Decathlon competition is almost over – the houses will be disassembled and and transported to their final placements. Team Boston solar home has already found its buyer in Cape Cod, where it will be available for public tours. Building this home was a bit less glamorous, and here I will tell you about our part – the installation of a flat roof.

Roof Design:

The roof was designed to allow for house to be transported in 3 sections, and to host 3 rows of solar panels, as well as collect all rain water. The house design team had to work really hard to make all three major requirements work together. The roof and the house were separated into 3 different sections, with separating parapet wall inside and around the perimeter. To avoid roof penetrations and as a result – roof leaks, the solar PV and hot-water racking systems had to be placed on top of parapet walls – both interior and exterior.

The roof drains and all roof penetrations had to be placed so they would be away from future solar system racking steel beams. The roof itself was designed so that all water in each section, would run toward the roof drain, with an overflow scuppers as back-up drains.

We utilized the 1/4″ (1/4″ rise to 1′ run) tapered insulation system, which would go from 1″ at the lowest spot to 5″ at the highest point. The roof drains were place at the lowest points of each roof section, while all roof penetrations were moved to the highest points on the roof.

Roofing Material: Because of multiple inside corners and roof penetrations, IB Flat Roofing PVC membrane was chosen and the best roofing system for the job, as it allows for all roof flashing components to be hot-air welded together, which eliminates a possibility of roof leaks due to seam failures. Even if the roof would be damaged during the construction process (there was constant foot traffic on the roof, after we finished installing it – plumbers, electricians and Solar PV installers), it would be easy to repair – as easy as welding a patch over damaged area – a one minute repair.

IB Flat Roof Installation – Day 1

Due to scheduling and timing matters, all construction on Boston Solar Home was performed on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays of each week. We started installing our roof on a Sunday, after 2 days of rain, and as we pulled up to the construction site at Tufts in Medford, MA, it was still drizzling, and the team members were vacuuming and pushing water off the roof. This was a challenge by itself. After pulling the tarps off the roof, there were about 4 inches of rain water trapped between parapet walls of the roof and tightly sealed moisture resistant roof decking. Water was slowly dripping inside the house, but a major part of it was still on the roof. Two holes were drilled through the roof sheeting in the overhang section, where the roof drains would soon be installed. The water quickly drained over the grass, but a third section of the roof had to be manually cleared of water with a wet vac and push-brooms.

Installing Roof Insulation: As we unloaded our tools and materials, the guys from team Boston, were finishing the roof drying process, the drizzle stopped and we were ready to start installing roof insulation – a tapered insulation system that would span between 1.5 and 5 inches. We used different thickness ISO insulation board, starting with 1″ at the bottom, and going up / leveling it off with tapered and straight insulation. All insulation was attached with heavy duty, corrosion resistant screws and plates. At the highest point the R-value of the insulation would be 30-R (6-r value per 1 inch of insulation). Additionally, there are approximately 12 inches of sprayed foam insulation between the rafters, which makes the roof of this solar home, super insulated and eliminates the weakest point in the house, and when it comes to heat loss, as most heat escapes through the roof.

Installing IB Roofing Membrane: Due to weather conditions, we had to start work late, and it was apparent that we would not finish the whole roof in one day – even with the help of about 6 architecture students from BAC, and Tom Paisley – a green builder from Middleboro, MA, who introduced me to people from Team Boston.

We were able to finish one section of the roof completely, including all the parapet wall flashing and inside corner detail, installed a temporary roof drain, as well as welded all the seams. Since the plumbing for the IB U-flow drains was not in place yet, we installed IB membrane drain liner, and fitted it into a temporary PVC pipe. On the second section of the roof, we only had time to lay down the field sheets of membrane and a drain liner, and left the parapet wall flashing and corners for next day.

IB Flat Roof Installation – Day 2

As we arrived to the job site the next morning, the sun was beaming down on us, and the temperature was nearing 95 degrees – there was not even a sign of rain from previous days.  I was so happy that the roofs we install are white and barely gain any heat form the sun – otherwise it would be near impossible to work in these weather conditions. Nevertheless, I went through at least a gallon of water that day.

Architecture students and volunteers were laying down the insulation as I jumped onto the roof, and started planning out the membrane layout, to minimize waste. Since IB Roof comes in 6 feet wide rolls, and the width of the roof sections was about 9-10 feet, there would be 2-3 feet of material I had to cut off. We would cut it in half, and use it for parapet wall flashing.

Once all insulation was in place, we could finish installing the IB Roofing membrane and welding all the seams to make the roof completely watertight. In total we had to flash 12 inside corners (and later, as we were doing the overflow drains, we had to install 6 outside corner flashings), 3 through-roof IB U-flow drains and 4 through roof penetrations: 1 for the bathroom vent and 3 others for Solar PV and Solar Hot Water hook-ups.

All seams were welded with the Swiss made Liester hot-air welding equipment which is a de facto standard in the thermoplastic roofing world. For long seams we used the Liester Triac Drive – an ultra portable semi-automatic welder which can make a life of a roofer much easier. When we need to weld a small section of a seam, the hand welders are perfect. But when it comes to longer seams, doing it by hand become, if not problematic, then very painful - literally. Hand welding can put a lot of stress on your wrists and that is why we invested heavily into automatic welding equipment.

Solar Home Roof installation video: Welding IB roof seams

One major obstacle we still had to solve was the the fact that Solar Home is built to be transportable in 3 sections. The IB roof membrane would have to be cut along the inside parapet walls, to take the house apart, and when the house is put together, it would have to be watertight, and preferably without having a roofer and hot air welding equipment on site. Although the parapet walls would be copped with aluminum parapet caps, it would not be a sufficient way to keep the house watertight and leaks free – maybe just for a short period. But the team could not afford to have roof leaks in the middle of Solar Decathlon competition or after. We had to figure out a way for the roof to be watertight not once, but every time the house is transported and put in place, without additional welding. This we took care of later, once the Solar PV and Hot Water panels rack system was installed.

We finished day two of roof installation as it was getting dark, and most architecture students had already left the job-site. Now we had to wait until the solar panels were ready to be installed.

IB Roof with Solar PV and Solar Hot Water panels – Day 3

Once the IB roof was installed and Boston Solar Home was watertight, we took a little break and concentrated on our everyday roof installation. In this time, the Team Boston was hard at work on the interior of the house as well as getting ready for the final stage of the roof installation – Solar PV and Solar Hot Water installation, which would use a Steel / Aluminum Racking systems bolted to the parapet walls.

By the time we got to the job site on the 3rd day of roof installation, the mounting racks were already in place and some Solar PV panels were also installed. We had to work around them and in some cases actually move the racking system and Solar Panels, so we could get into tight spaces.

We had to install all three IB u-flow drains (which due to their size did not fit between the solar racking system), pipe penetration flashings for exhaust pipe and solar electrical and plumbing hook-ups. We also had to install the over-flow drain scuppers and as I discussed before, we had to figure out a way for the house to be watertight after it was transported to Washington, DC fro the Solar Decathlon and to its future owners, preferably without roofer involvement.

We decided to weld a wide strip of IB membrane over parapet walls – one side would be welded while the other would remain not welded, but flipped over to the other section. This way the cut between house sections would always be watertight and with the addition of parapet caps, the wind driven water would never penetrate the roof. W also had to figure out how the “T” join of 3 house sections would work, and the overlapping joint covers were installed, each welded to its own section of the house.

As we finished installing all roof flashings, the house was all watertight and almost ready for the transportation to the Solar Village in Washington DC, for 2009 Solar Decathlon. There was still a lot of work to be done, like all the heating, interior, and other construction work, but our part was over. I did plan to volunteer some of my time to help team Boston with building this beautiful home, but as the busiest time of the roofing season rolled on, I could harly find time for my full time job. I did not see the Boston Solar Home until I actually went to DC for the Solar Decathlon, during the Columbus Day weekend.

Quick highlights of the Boston Solar Home:

• Size – approximately 800 sq. ft. Competition regulations limit solar home size to 800 sq. ft. and most contenders, except one, built their homes to maximum allotted size.
• Solar PV system size: 6.4 KW DC, with individual mini inverters to maximize electric output, and minimize shading losses.
• Wall insulation: 2 inches (13-r)  of ISO board with aluminum foil (more insulating value than regular ISO board) and 8 inches of in-wall insulation.
• Trombe wall – a liquid-filled solar thermal mass windows, that collect and store solar heat during the day and heat the house at night.
• Solar Hot Water – 5 hot water panels that provide heating and hot water for the house.

Because of size limitations, each team had to use the most efficient solar panels available on the market (not development products). This posed additional obstacles for the designers and builders, and forced the use of rack-mounting system to house solar panels. If the house was not limited to certain size, the use of IB Solar Wise PV system – the building integrated solar PV modules built by Uni-Solar, would greatly reduce the final cost of solar system and simplify the installation. IB SolarWise eliminates the need to use a rack mounting system as it is a thin-film solar system adhered to IB patented membrane – Solar Shield – which distributed the heat gain of solar panels and prevents delamination,  which is often the case when UniSolar panels are installed over rubber roofs of TPO single ply roofing systems.

Getting IB Roof and IB Solar PV systems installed in MA, CT and RI:

If you are interested in having IB PVC roofing membrane or IB SolarWise PV system installed on your home or business, feel free to fill out our online roofing estimate form to get free price quote. You can also use our interactive roofing price calculator to estimate the cost of your roof replacement and compare IB roof prices to those of EPDM Rubber, Modified Bitumen and Tar+Gravel roofs. We recently updated our calculator to account for smaller sized roofs, and to also include options for chimney or skylight flashing, parapet wall flashing and other roof penetrations.

You can check out the roofs that we have installed all over New England by looking at job profiles, which we regularly post for each state:

Flat roofs in Massachusetts

Flat roofs in Connecticut

Job profiles for RI and NH will be posted soon.

It is October, and the cold weather is upon us. Now most homeowners who did not have a chance to replace their leaking roofs during spring and summer, want to get it done now – before he cold weather arrives. August, September and October are the busiest months of the year for a roofing contractor (for us at least) we get many calls and online estimate requests from homeowners looking to install a new IB Flat Roof or a Metal Roof on their home. At least 75 percent of these inquiries, mention that they would like to have a new roof installed before the winter.

While we do understand your concern about having a new roof before winter weather comes, I must point out a misconception among homeowners, assuming that a roof can only be installed during the warm months. While this is partially true, due to limitations of specific roof types (technologies), for us, installing our roof systems in the winter is the same as if it was summer – just a little colder.

Basically, it is the best time for homeowners to have their roof installed during winter, as you will get the best roof prices, as well as a choice of best roofing contractors, as work is limited and contractors compete for work and lower their prices to get the job. However, be aware that some roofs can’t or should not be installed in the winter – read bellow to find out what you should know about winter roofing and which roofing materials should not be installed in the cold weather.

Which roofs can be installed in the winter and which can’t:

As mentioned before, there are certain types of roofing systems that should not be installed in the winter, and also those that can, without any compromises in quality. Let’s look at them, but first I will divided them into two logical groups - flat roofs and sloped roofs. Also lets establish that by “winter” I mean temperatures bellow 40 degrees F.

Flat Roofs:

When it comes to flat roofing, there are virtually only two systems that can be safely installed in the winter – PVC and TPO. These two are thermoplastic single ply flat roofing products which are installed using the Hot Air Welded seams instead of various types of adhesives.

In the winter, glues and adhesives will freeze, which will distort it chemical composition in one way or another, which can and will cause premature failure. This is why most, if not all liquid roofing products (be it adhesives, or liquid-applied roofs such as acrylic or urethane coatings)  should not even be stored under 40 degree F temperatures – never mind being installed in cold weather.

PVC and TPO on the other hand are attached to the deck using mechanical assembly with heavy duty screws and plates, and all seams are sealed using Hot Air welding equipment which usually operates at 800-1100 degrees F. Such high temperatures ensure that even during cold winter months, all seam welds will not be affected by the outside temperature. I do have to mention though that PVC and TPO roofs are not equal or identical. They are only similar in how they look and installed. Besides that, PVC and TPO roofs are very much different and cannot be compared directly. I encourage you to read our PVC vs. TPO roof comparison.

Following flat roof systems should not (cannot) be installed in the winter:

- Rubber Roofs (EPDM)

- Modified Bitumen (cold applied or torch applied)

- Any type of Peal-n-Stick flat roofing products, such as GAF Liberty or similar.

The three roof types listed above represent some of the most common roofing systems available on the market today, with the exception of PVC and TPO single ply membrane flat roofs. The PVC and TPO did not not make the list above since the can easily be installed in the winter without and spec violations, or quality reductions. As for the rest of these systems, they are installed using adhesives (except torch applied Mod. Bit. roof) and therefore installing them in the winter will result in leaks and potential roof blow-off.

In example of Rubber roofs, entire system is usually installed with several different adhesives (one to glue rubber to the insulation, on for seams, special seam primers and cleaners, etc.) and EVERY rubber roof manufacturer explicitly points out that their roof should not be installed in temps bellow 40 degrees. I encourage you to read the following heated discussion on Roofing.com forums about flat roofing in frigid north where many contractors, including some from New England, will insist that Rubber can be installed in the winter, by pre-warming the glue and working when the sun is out, so it would warm up the black rubber membrane, for better adhesion. I also was talking to on of the sales reps for a big rubber roof “private label” distributor, who was telling me that winter months installation should be times perfectly – all glue applied between 10 am and 2 pm, only when the sun is out, and then the seams can be done between 2 and 5 pm, provided that all glues and primers are kept warm.  My take on it is following: Rubber roof manufacturers clearly state that such roofs should not be installed in less then 40 degree temperatures. Reps will encourage their contractors to install in the winter, because the make a sales commission and contractors will install because they need to stay busy, all the while violating installation specs. The only one at a disadvantage is you – the roof owner and here is why.

Because rubber roof installers have to go through so many additional hustles to install rubber in the winter, while they still have to charge their normal rates or even less, because competition is fierce and there is not enough work to go around, they will have to cut SO many corners to stay a bit profitable. Therefore, what you get is a roof that was installed outside of manufacturers specifications, frustrated roofers installing it, and and potentially frozen adhesives and glue which will most likely result in roof leaks, and warranty claims would likely be denied. Despite the fact that PVC is far superior to the above roof types, if you still choose to have a rubber roof installed (for financial reasons for example), do not do it in the winter.

Peal and Stick roofing systems and underlayment should not be installed in the winter for obvious reasons – they will not properly stick to the roof deck or base ply, making leaks or even blow-off almost certain. Such roofs should ONLY be installed during warmer months of the year.

Sloped Roofs:

When it comes to sloped roofs, the choices are many and very few at the same time. Basically you have asphalt shingles, metal roofing, and other very rare types of roofing material which usually cost at least as much as metal roofs or more. These are Slate roofs, Tile roofs, Synthetic slate, Cedar shingle or shakes and that is about it. Since asphalt shingle is the most used typo of roofing material (merely because it is the very cheapest roof you can find) rivaled by metal roofs on the premium side, I will only consider these two types for the comparison.

Asphalt shingles can be installed in the winter, but extreme care must be taken by roofers installing it, not to bend and crack the shingle as well as not to trap moisture under the shingles. Because of the reality of winter roofing, very often both of the above are ignored by roofers, causing premature roof failures. Also, because asphalt shingle roofs are highly dependent on the proper seal between the overlapping shingles, which requires the solar heat to melt the seal strip, such roofs installed in the winter, often do not seal properly until warm weather rolls around, causing them top leak, and as a result, wood rot often develops under a brand new roof.

Another major limitation of asphalt shingles is its weakness against Ice Dams. Ice and Water (I&W) shield is the most commonly used method to prevent ice dam leaks. First of all I&W fails about 25 percent the time, and because it  also requires sun’s heat to properly adhere to the roof deck, in the winter, moisture develops between roof sheeting and underside of ice & water underlayment potentially making it useless.

Metal Roofs on the other hand can easily be installed in the winter without any compromises in quality of installation. First of all, with metal roof it is actually absolutely not necessary, as metal roof sheds water and ice, minimizing ice build up on the roof. Also the interlocking design prevents water from traveling upward. All this renders the ice & water shield useless. At the same time it prevents the proper breathing (ventilation) of the roof deck which shortens its service life. And ultimate goal is that the roof deck lasts as long as the metal roof over it, which in the case of aluminum shingles is a very long time. Therefore, unless you or the building inspector want Ice & Water to be there, I think it is best not to put it on. We use a premium breathable synthetic underlayment – GAF DeckShiled which makes the roof watertight even without a metal roof over it, and helps the wood “breath”.

Cold weather also does not affect metal roofs as they won’t crack due to “improper handling” and metal roofs are designed to allow for expansion and contraction, so the outside temperatures won’t make a difference.

As you can see, IB PVC roofs and Metal roofing systems are the best system to have installed, year round!

If you are looking to replace your flat or sloped roof, we invite you to look at jobs we’ve done around New England. You can also fill out our Roof Estimate request form to get a free price quote for replacing your roof, or use our interactive roofing price calculator to estimate the cost of your new roof.

- Massachusetts Roofing

- Connecticut Roofing

We constantly update these pages, adding jobs we’ve done recently and those that were done some time ago. It is a slow process as we try to describe each job in as many details, and point out certain common roofing problems and how we overcome them. Soon we will add roofs that we have completed in Rhode Island and New Hampshire, as well as more MA and CT roofing jobs.

Some Massachusetts and Connecticut roofs we’ve installed in the winter:

Flat roof in Lowell, MA – one of the most recent roofs, installed in the beginning of Dec. 2009. Here we removed old epdm rubber roof, which shrunk and pulled away from the walls and roof edges. We replaced this roof with new IB PVC flat roofing membrane, and added 4″ of ISO insulation to improve weather-tightness and energy efficiency of this home.

Flat roof in Andover, CT – this roof was installed in January 2009, right in the middle of brutal cold storm which overtook New England for almost two weeks, and temperatures reached as low as -16 degrees F. There, the homeowner, with help of his buddies, removed the old roof, and fixed the roof deck, and covered the roof with a tarp. We had to quickly come in and install a new 50-mil IB roof, right before another snow storm hit.

Metal Roof in Brighton, MA – an new aluminum shingles metal roof was installed on a roof of a very busy IHOP restaurant, while it was open for business. This large roofing project involved complete removal and replacement of old metal shingles, all plywood decking, which was mostly rotted, replacement of some rafters and installation for new GAF Deck Armor underlayment and a new metal roof. Due to many major snow storms during that winter, this project took almost two month to complete. About same time 2 years ago we also installed another metal roof on an IHOP restaurant in Hyannis, Massachusetts.

Rubber roofing (EPDM) is not the best system for flat roofs, but in some instances, it just does not work right off the bet, and when it leaks, repairing such a roof is not even an option. In late July of 2009 we began work on one such roof in Roxbury , MA – a neighborhood of Boston, located 15 minutes from downtown.

The roof was installed by an unqualified roofing contractor that apperanly never installed a rubber roof before, nor did the contractor care about quality at all, which you can judge for yourself from the photographs of the roof that we’ve provided. As you will be able to see, this particular roof, though small, required a lot of detail work which is the defining factor of weather this roof will leak or not. The roofer that installed the EPDM rubber on this roof, completely skipped the flashing part, choosing to instead caulk the corners with rubber lap sealants, and in some cases use the sealant to adhere membrane seams. As a result, most seams – even those that were glued together with rubber glue, partially or completely came apart.

In addition to a generally horrible roof installation practice used by the contractor, the home owner – Jim  - was very concerned about insulation screws being loose under the rubber roof and in some places penetrating the roof, cratering more leaks. Despite all the corner cutting and improper installation of the rubber roof, Jim had one advantage that kept his house more or less watertight, and without major roof leaks. The roof was built with a slight slope, which diverted all the water toward the through wall drain, while parapet walls kept the water from spilling over the roof edges.

Just as a side note, this house used to be a part of a larger building, which was partially demolished at some point in time. Its back wall now, used to be a separation firewall between different sections of the building. You can easily figure it out by looking a the brick on the front and back of the house. This brings up a mystery which I cannot solve: The through-wall drain is located in the back of the house where the old separation wall is now. Therefore, back when the house was bigger, all the water would flow to the adjacent section of the roof. Still it had to drain somewhere, otherwise the house would be completely flooded, and a roof could actually collapse under all that weight. I suppose there were through-roof drains which were buried / removed during one of the re-roofs and a through-wall drain was created when rear part of the building was removed. I will come back to this topic later on, when I’ll discuss the parapet walls on this house.

General roof details:

This was actually a very small roof (just over 400 sq. ft), which however took us more than 7 working days to complete. Most of this time was spent on preparation work and many repairs we had to perform, before the new 80-mil IB PVC flat roof membrane would go on. All these repairs had to be performed while maintaining roof water-tightness. Using tarps on this roof would be nearly impossible and time consuming to put up, because of the roofs shape. The roof has two round towers on the front, a “head-house” or a stairs walk out that leads to the roof in the center and parapet walls all around. In addition to all the given obstacles, to perform a quality roof installation we had to remove all siding and the door off the head house, and then put it all back together when roof was complete.

Roof installation – Day 0ne:

On the first day of roof installation was more like a test run, and we got rained out in the middle of the day. We started out the installation by removing the drip edge from the parapet walls and pulling back the rubber membrane to expose parapet walls. The reason for not just cutting rubber at the base of the roof and actually puling int back was discussed earlier – we had to keep roof watertight when we leave for the night and by maintaining a the old rubber intact, we could simply put back the flaps and attach them back to parapets, until we come back the next day. We also planned to install a 2×8 pressure treated (PT) wood nailer over the parapet walls, by attaching them with masonry anchors, and Liquid Nails adhesive (for additional rigidity). To our disappointment, over entire length of the parapet wall, the bricks were completely loose. Old mortar fell apart, damaged by age, moisture and other weather-related factors.

Between days 1 and 2 which were Friday and Monday, we went to install an IB roof that we sponsored for a Team Boston Solar Decathlon home with Solar PV roof. Since all construction on the Solar Home happened over weekend and the house needed a roof, to allow the crew to start work on the inside, we had to work all weekend to put on a new roof with a tapered insulation system.

The next day (Monday) we were back on the job site continuing work on the parapet wall repair.

As we dug deeper, it turned out that we had to replace at least 3 rows of brick mortar. We could not go any lower as that would create potentially disastrous situation with the old casted metals moldings installed on the outside of the parapets. This metal moldings were held in place by nails inserted into the brick joints. If we would remove another row of bricks, the metal would just come loose and fall to the ground in one piece. Fortunately as we dug deeper, the strength of mortar improved and we did not have to go down any more. Once the old brick was removed and old mortar, dirt / dust and other loose debris were vacuumed out, we could begin putting new mortar and bricks back. We had to wash and wire brush every brick, before it was laid back into the parapet wall. If you ask why not use new bricks – answer is very simple. The new bricks that you get from Home Depot or Lowe’s are junk. I could break on apart with my hands. Old bricks were of the exceptional quality and strength, and were solid brick (no cavities) which allowed us to securely attach masonry anchors later on in the roof installation.

Roof installation – days 2 through 5: brick work on parapet walls:

While maintaining rubber roof integrity, we replaced / repaired top 3 rows of brick parapet walls and performed all other prep work, while getting ready for the big push – complete removal of all rubber roofing and laying a new 80-mil IB PVC flat roofing system. The entire process had to be done in one day, so everything had to be ready. We removed old metal flashing, installed all wood nailer boards, membrane over parapet walls and drip edge before tearing off old rubber roof. Now the roof was ready.

At the end of day 5 we took down all th metal coping off the outside of the parapet walls. At this point it was dangerously hanging, nailed through the brick joints. One person would stand on the ground, making sure there were no pedestrians walking near the house while I was cutting the metal coping and taking it down in small sections. When all the metal was successfully removed, I was no longer worried that it may fall off on its own. Although we attached it to the rubber membrane over night with no chance of becoming loose, I still could not wait until the metal was completely removed.

Roof installation – days 6 & 7: installing IB roof and welding seams

Once everything was prepared, the actual roof installation took two days. First we laid down and mechanically attached all the membrane. All field seams were welded before any flashing work began. Once main membrane was installed we flipped down all the membrane that was already installed on parapets and welded it down to the main roof. Then the roof to wall flashing on the head house was installed, and it was now time to flash the chimney and at the same time make a new through-wall drain liner, so the water would run off the roof into the gutter which we later installed along the back wall of the house.

At the end of day 7, all roof flashing was welded together, roof attic vents and membrane vents installed, the door was put back on the roof entrance and everything was watertight. All we had to do now is to come back one more time to install the new commercial 6″ gutter and 4×3″ downspouts.

Although this roof took twice as long as originally planed, we had enough time to fix everything and get the roof ready and now it will perform flawlessly, protecting this house from water and reducing the inside temperatures in the summer, thanks to roof’s cool white surface.

Here is what Jim (the homeowner) has to say:

Hi Leo,

I’m writing to pass on my thanks. The new IB roof is a vast improvement over the poorly installed rubber one that preceded it. It was also a great idea to swap in some of the heavier IB for the main floor area. I can tell how solid and rugged it is.

I can also confirm that it’s working, believe it or not. There was a section of wall in the upstairs hallway which had gotten damp, to the point that paint had begun to peel there. I’m likely going to replace the sheet-rock at that spot anyway, to be safe. But it is now bone-dry! We’ll see how it goes, but it seems to be off to a promising start.

I much appreciate the thoroughness and quality of your worksmanship, and that of your crew.

All the Best,
Jim

This will be project profile of a flat roofing system installed over a sun-room roof in Wellesley, Massachusetts. The roof system was planned in such a way that a premium wooden deck would be installed over it, and the long-lasting water-tightness was most important aspect, and the the same time aesthetics were also important.

Waterproofing a flat roof deck:

Wellesley is know for its beautiful mansions and only the best building products (such as IB Flat roof) make their way into these homes. Having a backyard deck is a great addition to the coziness of any home, and very often such decks are built over a sun room, garage, or other living space. Therefore, having such deck completely watertight is of utmost importance. If this flat roof deck leaks, it would be very difficult to trace a leak as a wooden deck siting on slippers over the waterproofing layer is usually built as one piece and it would require a complete dis-assembly of the deck to find and fix the roof leak.

Railing systems on flat roof decks:

Each deck must have a railing system. For aesthetic and structural reasons, it is best to install the railing posts through the roof and tie them into roof rafters, rather than attach them to the outside perimeter of the deck. However to make these through the roof posts watertight using conventional flat roofing systems such as rubber roof, is nearly impossible in the long run.

Why IB Roof is perfect waterproofing system for flat roof decks:

Because of such high demands to the roofing material to be watertight and long lasting, IB Flat Roof was chosen as the product of choice for this high end residential home in a secluded neighborhood of Wellesley, MA. While this home was going through a complete renovation, a large addition was built in the rear of the House including a beautiful sun roof, and a beautiful premium wooden deck will be built on top of an 80-mil commercial grade PVC roofing membrane.

Installation:

When the general contractor was building this garage with plans to have a deck over flat roof, one of the major concerns was to drain water off the roof and avoid any ponding water. Having a through roof drain was not very practical as the roof would be divided into 16 sections by the deck slippers and most of the water would never get to the drain. Therefore, the roof framing was built with a slight slope away from the house.  Although this could be achieved with tapered insulation, it is always better to have the framing with a slight slope, especially if there is a rubber roof which can leak and saturated insulation would settle under the wight of the roof deck.

When planning the installation of this roof, we had to take into consideration such factors as deck slippers running across the roof every 16″ O.C., eight through roof railing posts around the perimeter, and a slider door leading onto the deck. Most flat roofs that we install are mechanically attached, using heavy duty roofing screws and barbed steel plates. During the roof installation we had to make sure that all our plates and fasteners holding down the insulation and the roofing membrane, would be place between the slippers laying directly on the roof, to prevent the fastener rubbing through the IB membrane and creating a leak.

We marked the spots where the slippers would run along the wall and the drip edge, and using a chalk line, place all fasteners between the slippers. Additionally, once the roof was complete, we installed 2″ wide strips of membrane, tap-welded in place. These strips will be additional separation layer to protect the membrane from the deck slippers rubbing against it.

To make sure there are as little welds (membrane seams put together using fusion hot-air welding process) we aligned the first 6′ wide sheet of the membrane with the rail posts, pre-cut the holes in the membrane and slid the membrane over the posts. Next two sheets were aligned the same way and attached to the roof. Once in place, the membrane was welded to the custom made 3″ wide PVC coated drip edge, that was made in Bronze color. All Seams were welded across the roof, and now it was time to install roof to wall and pre-manufactured one piece post flashings.

Post flashings for deck roofs:

A quick work about these post flashings - as any other penetration flashing that is a part of IB Roof system, the postflashings are made in the controlled environment to the installer’s specs, to fit tightly around the post and eliminate potential installation errors of in-field flashing using non-reinforced flashing membrane. All we have to do with theseflashings is slide them over the past and weld the flap to the roof. That is it – the post is completely watertight. Although the pre-made post flashing costs more than just non-reinforced material, the time saved during the installation and zero chance of a leak, after a proper installation, make it a much more economical way to permanent watertight roof deck with trough roof posts.

In conclusion, I would also mention that there is an alternative to having to build a deck over flat roof – it is IB Deck-Shield, which works just like any other IB roof, but is designed to be slip and puncture resistant and allows you to walk over it just like as if it was a wooden deck.

If you need to install or replace your flat roof or to build a deck over IB roof, fill out our roofing estimate for and we will also send you an online price quote.

The word on the “roofing contractor street” is such that a large PVC roofing manufacturer has problems with their Roof-integrated Solar PV systems. Apparently, the way they designed and installed these solar roofs, the electrical wiring which  connects Solar PV panels to the inverter and essentially the Electric Grid, is overheating and poses serious risks of fire. Since this information is still in rumor stage, and I doubt there will be an official announcement or acknowledgment of these, I for many reasons cannot name the manufacturer, the specifics of the problems or the source. However, there is evidence that it is real. If you are a large roofing contractor in Boston, MA area or in the rest of New England, you are getting the roofing bid lists such as the Blue Book. We do not as large commercial and government roofing jobs are a little out of our league, and we get plenty of work without paying huge sums of money for these bid lists (it costs anywhere from $3000/year to get periodic updates). However, in the last 3 weeks I’ve been contacted twice by two different gentlemen from Suffolk Construction. Basically Suffolk is arguably the largest GC in Boston area with $1.57 Billion in sales in 2008, have over 800 employees and are rated #313 of America’s Largest Private Companies by Forbes.

The picture bellow, shows a Solar roof produced by IB roof systems. This roof does NOT have overheating problems, and is intended to demonstrate what Solar Roofing is.

In any case, the two gentlemen from Suffolk, asked me to bid a new job in the pipeline of roof bidding lists:  A 4,000 squares (400,000 sq. ft.) on the IRS building in Andover, MA, and also they wanted 500 KW solar PV system that would be roof integrated – essentially they were interested in out IB Solar Wise PV system which in some ways is similar to the one above, but without the wiring overheating of course The similarity is in the usage of the UniSolar Thin-Film PV laminates. Other than that, all other components of these Solar Roof systems are proprietary and are very different. So how are the two evens connected? It is my understanding that the Solar roof described above, was originally specified for this IRS roof, but because of the problems, they are looking for the one that works. Because IB SolarWise is about the only Solar Roof systems out there that does not have any problems with it, Suffolk contacted us on two occasions. Aside from the cable overheating and fire hazards, most other flat roofing manufacturers that wanted to use their roofs with UniSolar PV laminates, ran into problems of solar panels delaminating form the roofing membrane. IB Roofs took their time designing the IB SolarWise PV system, and developed a special membrane called IB Solar Shield which is designed to provide excellent adhesion between the PVC material use in IB roofs and the Butyl adhesive on the UniSolar pv laminates. This eliminates the potential of delamination that most (if not all) other roofing manufacturers are facing. The earlier version of IB SolarWise used the solar panels made by Open Energy of California. Later UniSolar panels were chosen as default integrated PV system because it allows for greater flexibility for the contractor, system designers and the customer.

Today’s IB SolarWise PV systems are made in the following way: IB takes 6×19′ Solar Shield membrane and placed 4 UniSolar 136 watt modules using a special process which insures the proper bond between two products. Then the whole IB Solar Wise module gets welded to the already installed IB Flat Roof. IB uses regular UniSolar modules with the connectors facing the outside of the module. Although this requires special housing to protect the connectors from UV rays, it eliminates the possibility of cable overheating as all wares are exposed to the air and are ventilated. This makes IB Solar Wise the best solar-integrated roofing PV system. If you are looking for more information about solar roofing in general or want to know if solar will work for you, we recommend that you read our Solar PV design & installation guide.