Single-Ply - Fully-Adhered or Fastened?

Getting back into single-ply after 20 years. Fully-adhered vs mechanically-fastened?

Mike H Said: Keep watching Sean, in a few more years youll see the Carlisle wear thru to the threads if there are any high south facing walls reflecting onto the roof.

Tim, I have no recollection of that. Dave Chenoweth bought my old Variant units after I upgraded all crews to the Varimat.

Hmmm, I was pretty sure it was you Mike, but I could be wrong. It was in a big wooden box, I think the price was $3,000 with the hand welders. I can't find the transaction on Quickbooks. That'll bug me the rest of the morning...

Sean, by no means am I a fan of TPO. I wasn't a huge fan of SPF, either. But the market wants what the market wants. Around here 90% of spec's are for TPO. We will simply arrange our guarantees accordingly, knowing that in this region, the chances of a roof going more than 9-11 years without hail damage is somewhere near zero. That seems like an oddity to those outside the halbert, but we don't worry too much about roofs needing to last much longer than that without the insurance company stepping in to repair or replace them.

I still think that chopped fiberglass emulsion roofing is the best value in commercial roofing hands down. Alas, it has gotten harder and harder to sell it.

yeah Mike, time will tell. right now they are all mostly still under warranty and the licenced installers are still dealing with them. usually when they get off their warranties, is when I get them. I do see it with the scrim of the MF systems though.

Keep watching Sean, in a few more years you'll see the Carlisle wear thru to the threads if there are any high south facing walls reflecting onto the roof.

Tim, I have no recollection of that. Dave Chenoweth bought my old Variant units after I upgraded all crews to the Varimat.

No, I don't install them, I only do roof repairs. so I see whats doing good and whats failing and how to fix the bad ones. with TPO from Carlisle and firestone, I only see workmanship issues, mainly they are either not welding good enough or they heat up the material too much and thins out the membrane, which in about 6-8 years a hole pops where it was too hot. Lots of Liester burn holes pop up after a few years. Durolast? I am seeing all kinds of different things with them, from material, to workmanship, to specs. other similar membranes are also burning easily.

Roof guy, if you're going to go with TPO, it doesn't matter, I'm fixing all kinds of issues with TPO after less than 8 years.

Go with EPDM, not TPO.

We have options on this 300 SQR job, can do it MA or SA. Will need to get retrained, it's been 20 years since we did one. In fact, I sold our Leister to Mike Hicks, if memory serves.

I've never done a MA TPO. I've bid them for a few spec'd jobs but always get outbid. It seems like the cheap route and that is usually a race to the bottom for somebody who plans to be here long enough to maintain the roof later on. I mainly assumed it was inferior or problematic.

Hearing Mike and other's saying that MA can be a preferable system brings a few jobs to mind that I could sell if I could drop the price a few dollars.

With rubber, adhered

Everything else, MF

With two, it really doesn't matter, but with pvc the membrane lasts longer than the glue. At least with a good pvc.

The biggest fear I have with adhered tpo is the dimensional instability of the membrane,it moves A LOT. I believe it contributes to bond breakage.

Adhered is the way to go. I'm keeping the 60 mil adhered going to 25+ years. MF systems, I'm only getting about 12 years. the rubber is too thin on the MF. the screen takes up too much of the thickness, in between the scrim, the rubber is thin, the sun is eating it away. the 60 mil adhered is 60 mil throughout the whole sheet, typically. repairs are inexpensive and easy to find. unlike the MF.

One of the highest average wind speeds in the nation here.