Customer Needs Lead to Tremco Cold Process Roofing System

Beachwood, OH (March 4, 2004) – A number of Tremco’s Roofing and Building Maintenance Division customers had a request - due to storms, they needed roofing systems with greater wind resistance. Tremco made a crucial change to its popular BURmastic® cold process built-up roof (BUR) system and submitted it, a hot process BUR system and a hot process POWERply modified bitumen system, to Factory Mutual Approvals (FM Approvals) for wind uplift testing. All three systems were built over steel roof decks.

The results were the highest FM Approvals wind uplift rating awarded to-date for a cold process BUR system built on a steel deck (120 pounds per square foot, or Class I-120), and upgraded ratings for the two hot process roofing systems to 150 pounds per square foot (Class I-150). “This enhancement is vital to any customer who needs greater protection from high winds, such as those in areas subject to hurricanes or strong thunderstorms,” said Greg Rudolph, Tremco Roofing’s vice president of Product Development. “In fact, the initiative for this upgrade came from customers in Puerto Rico, where these weather conditions are not uncommon.”

FM Approvals tested the roof systems’ resistance to wind uplift pressure, not wind speed. “While there is no direct 1:1 correlation between these two factors, typically the more pressure that a roof can withstand, the higher wind speeds it can take,” according to Tremco Roofing Architectural Specialist Tom Biller, who managed the test for the company.

Before these tests, Tremco’s wind uplift ratings for cold process BUR systems were approximately 90 pounds per square foot, still excellent performance.  Tremco changed the roof system’s composition by using their Solvent-Free BURmastic® to adhere the base sheet to the insulation. FM Approvals allows roofing systems to cure for only 28 days before starting the wind uplift test, and solvent-based, cold-applied adhesives rarely develop enough adhesion in 28 days to handle higher uplift pressures. Solvent-Free BURmastic adhesive cures much faster than solvent-based adhesives, strengthening the roof system and allowing it to obtain the much higher wind uplift rating.

“Of course we’re delighted that FM Approvals awarded us higher wind uplift ratings for all three systems, particularly the exclusive rating for our cold-process BUR system,” Rudolph said. “But even more important to us is the fact that this happened because we responded to customer needs. Our customers told us they needed more wind-resistant roofs, so we enhanced our process by using Solvent-Free BURmastic adhesive to create stronger, faster-curing roof systems. We make a better product, which testing validated, and our customers get the response, roofing systems and protection they expect from Tremco.”         

FM Approvals, a division of FM Global, tests property loss prevention products and services, and provides third-party certification for those meeting its rigorous loss prevention standards.

Headquartered in Beachwood, OH, Tremco Inc. and WTI, ISO 9001:2000 certified companies, provide Roofing and Weatherproofing Peace of Mind to educational, healthcare, government, and industrial customers. In business since 1928, Tremco joined the RPM International Inc. family of companies in 1997. For more information about Tremco Roofing or WTI, visit our websites, (www.tremcoroofing.com) and (www.wtiservices.com),

or call us at 1-800-562-2728.