roofing maintance

I have just returned from the annual RV Show in Hershey Pa. This is one of the largest RV shows in the country. There were over 900 RVs on display. There were also over 100 venders that supplied the RV market. If you are looking for a RV this is a great show to see so many different models of RVs. One thing I learned while at this show was the misinformation concerning RV roofs. Most RVs have a EPDM Rubber Roof or one that is smooth fiberglass. Most of the misinfromaiton is about the EPDM roofs. I don't think this wrong information is intentional but never the less it is out there. Over the next couple of weeks I will talk about the proper way to care and repair a EPDM rubber roof. I know we have talked about this before but I was shocked by the information I recieved about caring for your EPDM roof. One of the biggest concerns I had was with all of the people telling RV owners to wash their roofs each year. To understand why this is not a good idea we will have to deal with the manufacturers sugguestions and care for their products. To begin with there are only two different manufactures of White on Black EPDM roofing in the United States. There are Carlisle and Firestone. This may supprise you, since you never hear their name associated with the roofs on RVs. They only make the membrane and sell it to different distrubitors who sell to dealers and then to the public. The EPDM roofing product was developed for the commerical roofing market. It was sold in two colors black and white. These roofing products were sold all over the country and there are billions of square feet of EPDM roofing on roofs today. The warrantys varied from ten to twenty years. The black EPDM dominates the commerical roofintg market today but is not used in the RV market because of heat related issues. So we will deal specifically with the white EPDM roofing. White EPDM roofing tends to chalk. What I mean by this is that you will notice in a few years streaks running down the side of your camper. This occurs because the sunlight and UV rays shine on the membrane and causes this to happen. This will happen to almost any white rubber product when exposed to direct sunlight. So don't be to alarmed when you see this happen. The manufactures of this membrane have never recommended to clean it yearly. There is a reason for this. When you clean this membrane you are washing off the material that has chalked and crased. This exposed a new layer to direct sunlight and it will also chalk. In a round about way you are washing away some of your roof. I know that dealers say wash your roof and then coat it. We will deal with this in next post.

I just thought I would let everyone know that I have a friend who has a 34' RV that needs a total roof replacement. I am in the process of ordering the materials for him. I am also going to help them tear off the old roof and install a new white on black EDPM rubber roofing membrane. I will make post about the materials I use and how hard or easy the installation process is. An estimate of $2,650 was given to hire a dealer put on a new roof on this RV. I have found the materials on line for about $500 plus shipping. I will try to keep up with all of the cost and time involved with this project and report it. I hope this information will help some of you decide if you can do this install yourself and if it will save you much money.

epdm repair

I have talked about epdm roofing installations and coatings but I don't think I have made a strong enough warnings about coatings. I have said make sure your coating is compatable with epdm roofing, which is true. But I still run across people who try to repair this roof with an asphalt type of coating which will only work for a short time and then will attack the epdm membrane and cause failure. I just want to say never, never, never use an asphalt type product to repair a epdm rubber roofing system. If you do when your roof leaks again and you have to do permenant repairs it will only cost you more money.

If you have a flat or low sloped roof on your house that is leaking and you need to fix this area, I would sugguest using epdm rubber roofing. If you do this yourself you can save a lot of money. In most instances you would take off the old roofing down to the wood deck and glue epdm roofing to the deck. It is always better to fully adhear the rubber to the deck. This will give you a good long term roof. Almost all epdm rubber roofing failures are related to the installation and I have found out from over twenty years of experance that a fully-adheared roof gives you less problems. Before you order your rubber roofing measure the roof and if possible buy it in one piece. This way you don't have to make any seams. But if you have to order your roof in pieces it will be easier to make your seams with a butly seam tape. This tape was developed to work with epdm roofing. You can make your seams with glue but this is more difficult and takes more experance.

We are now in the middle of winter in most of the country. Of course if you are in an area where the temperatures are freezing, your roof is probably not leaking. But you probably know if it has been leaking in the past. Now is a good time to make plans to repair your roof or rv while most business are not busy. The economy seems to be picking up and most suppliers of roofing products are raising their prices. This usually happens around April. So you might want to measure your roof and determine which products you need and order them now. The only thing you need to note is that be sure the temperatures are above freezing for the shipping of these products to you. You can work with your supplier to determine if the conditions are right to ship to you. Be sure to store your adhesive in a place that it will not freeze untill you need it. Be sure to check with your supplier before you install, to make sure what temperatures the product will work in.

There seems to be a lot of confusing with all of the coatings that are advertised for covering rv roofs. Some of these coatings are not compatable with EPDM roofs which have been installed for over 15 years on rvs. Always be sure that your coating is compatable with your roof. You could make your roof repair worse with the wrong materials. You need to be sure that anytime you apply coatings you spend extra time and effort cleaning you existing roof. After you have cleaned your existing roof and think it is clean it wouldn't be a bad idea to do it again. Then carefully examine your existing roof for major defects. Remember even if you do a good job coating your EPDM roof, your coating is only as good as the surface you coated. The biggest problem I have with any coatings is the application process. Most instructions will tell that a gallon is to cover a certain square footage. They tell you it should be a certain thickness on the roof to work properly. I can tell you from experience it is very difficult to spread a coating on a roof with a paint roller and keep the same thickness all over the roof. You will be heavy in some areas and thin in others. The insturctions on the can will tell you to measure a certain square footage and to apply a certain amount of coating in this area to see if you are using enough or too much. If you do coat an area to thin this will fail in time. The only plus side I see to using coatings is that you don't have to remover your air-conditionar or vents.

folks I am sorry that I have ingnored this blog since july of 2010. I hope to spend more time and provide more information in 2011. I did have a question posted in 2010 about bicycle patch kits and why would'nt they work for EPDM roofing. A bicycle tire tube is mostly made of butyl rubber which is easier to stick a patch to than EPDM. The thickness of the intertube is usually under .020mil. The thickness of the EPDM roofing is usually .045 mil. So a patch kit designed for EPDM would be thicker and work better. I am not saying that bicycle patch would not work for small holes but it would not be recommended by the manufacture. Remember however you patch your rubber roof to be sure to clean it thourghly. This is the single most important thing you can do to make any patch stick.