Tuesday, January 25, 2011
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.
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