Metal Roofing

This is the only question that matters, and it gets answered with core cuts before anyone quotes a price.

Good candidates: the membrane or surfacing is weathered, chalking, losing granules or losing reflectivity, but intact; leaks are at seams, laps, flashings and penetrations rather than through a failed field; the insulation is dry, confirmed by core cuts and, on larger roofs, an infrared or moisture survey; the deck is sound; drainage functions or can be corrected; and the roof has not already been coated and neglected through a full cycle.

Poor candidates: wet insulation anywhere meaningful — a coating over saturated insulation seals water in, and the assembly rots quietly under a warranty you paid for; a deteriorating deck; membrane that is broadly brittle, shrinking, split or alligatored through; severe ponding that has not been corrected first; and a roof already at or past its structural service life.

We take cores, scan where it matters, and show you photographs. If your roof is not a candidate we will tell you so, because a failed coating is worse for you than a replacement and worse for us than the job we did not sell.

Sequence, with the cost concentrated in the first four steps rather than the last one:

1. Assessment — core cuts, moisture survey, drainage review, defect inventory, photographs.
2. Repair — wet insulation cut out and replaced, splits and blisters repaired, failed flashings rebuilt, fasteners replaced on metal, drainage corrected.
3. Cleaning — pressure washing and degreasing to a surface the coating will actually bond to. Adhesion failures almost always trace to this step being rushed.
4. Priming where the substrate requires it, which varies by membrane type and by coating chemistry.
5. Reinforcement — polyester fabric embedded in mastic over every seam, lap, penetration, curb, drain and transition. This is where a restoration earns its warranty.
6. Base and top coats applied at specified dry film thickness, verified with wet-mil gauges as work proceeds, not estimated afterward.
7. Documentation — material quantities used, thickness records, photographs, and the manufacturer warranty registration.

Ask any bidder for the specified dry film thickness and the quantity of material it requires per square. A bid that cannot answer is pricing a thinner roof than the one you think you are buying.

Three chemistries with genuinely different strengths, and the right one is a per-roof decision.

• Silicone — the workhorse in this region. Outstanding UV resistance and the best tolerance for ponding water of the three, cures in humidity, and holds up over decades. It stays slick when wet, attracts dirt over time (reducing reflectivity somewhat), and future recoats must be silicone, since little else bonds to it.
• Acrylic — water-based, economical, highly reflective, and pleasant to work with. It needs a proper cure window with no rain and temperatures above about 50 degrees, and it does not tolerate standing water — it will re-emulsify in ponding areas. Excellent on well-draining roofs and on metal.
• Urethane — the toughest surface, with real impact and foot-traffic resistance. Often used as a top coat over a base, or on roofs with heavy rooftop service traffic. Higher cost and more sensitive application.

In practice: chronic ponding or a humid schedule points to silicone; a well-drained roof on a budget points to acrylic; heavy foot traffic points to urethane or a granulated top surface.

• TPO — a weathered membrane with a dry assembly restores well; probe and repair welds first, and prime per the coating manufacturer.
• EPDM — chalking rubber takes a formulated system well, but requires the correct primer; seams get reinforced as a matter of course.
• PVC — restorable with compatible systems; compatibility is not optional here.
• Modified bitumen — one of the best-value restorations in roofing, and timing is everything: coat a granule-losing surface before it cracks through, not after.
• Built-up — smooth and cap-sheet BUR restore well with sound plies; gravel-surfaced roofs need the aggregate addressed first and are often not practical.
• Metal — arguably the best substrate of all, because coatings fix exactly what metal suffers: fasteners, laps, surface rust and heat gain.
• Spray foam — recoating is not optional maintenance on foam, it is the system requirement, roughly every 10 to 20 years.

Restoration typically costs a fraction of tear-off and replacement, and the savings are not only in materials. There is no tear-off, so no interior exposure, no dumpsters and crane staging for days, no disruption to tenants or operations, and no landfill volume — the existing roof stays in place.

The point many owners miss: a restoration is often treated as maintenance or repair rather than a capital improvement, which changes how it hits a budget and a tax position entirely differently than a replacement does. That is a question for your accountant, not your roofer, and we are not offering tax advice — but it is worth asking, because it is frequently the difference between a project approved this year and a project deferred until the roof fails.

For a property manager running a portfolio, restorations are the highest-leverage line items in a capital plan: each one defers a replacement by years and smooths the spending curve. See property management.

Manufacturer restoration warranties commonly run 10, 15 or 20 years, and the term is driven mostly by dry film thickness — more material, longer warranty. Understand what you are getting:

• Material-only warranties cover the coating product. Labor to fix a failure is yours.
• Labor and material (NDL-style) warranties cover both, cost more, and require a manufacturer-approved applicator and an inspection at completion.
• Nearly all of them require documented maintenance and prompt reporting of damage. A roof with no inspection history is an easy denial.
• They cover the coating, not the roof under it. If the substrate fails because wet insulation was coated over, that is not a warranty claim — which is why the core cuts at the front end matter so much.

Our own lifetime workmanship warranty stands behind our installation work alongside whatever the manufacturer provides. And when the honest answer is that a coating will not serve you, we say so before you buy one.

A restored roof is not finished, it is renewed — and renewable again. Coatings weather and thin, and a roof that is recoated on cycle can be extended repeatedly. Silicone systems typically run the longest between recoats; acrylics need attention sooner, especially in ponding areas.

Maintenance is the same discipline as any other commercial roof: two inspections a year plus post-storm checks, drains and scuppers cleared, reinforced details examined, coating thickness and wear assessed particularly at traffic routes and ponding areas, punctures repaired, and a dated photographic report filed each visit for your warranty file.

Also: coordinate other trades. A coated roof is easy to damage with dragged equipment and dropped tools, and HVAC, solar and sign work that penetrates a restoration without proper flashing undoes it and can void the warranty.

Warehouses and distribution, manufacturing, retail centers, office buildings, schools and municipal facilities, churches, apartment and condominium property, self-storage, hospitality, and metal buildings of every kind — anywhere an owner is facing a replacement quote on a roof that may not actually need replacing.

Warehouse, distribution and industrial restorations lead volume around St. Louis, Kansas City and Indianapolis; metal building and agricultural restorations dominate around Springfield, Columbia and Jefferson City and across Metro East and Southern Illinois; and hospitality, retail and condominium restorations lead at the Lake of the Ozarks, where closing a building for a tear-off is rarely an option.

We install and service coating and restoration systems from seven local offices covering 143 cities in Missouri, Kansas, Illinois and Indiana. Each market runs its own crews and its own number — call the office nearest the building.

• St. Louis — (314) 429-6000
• Kansas City — (816) 872-9500
• Indianapolis — (317) 726-6000
• Springfield — (417) 429-1927
• Columbia / Jefferson City — (573) 343-8993
• Lake of the Ozarks — (573) 343-8993
• Metro East & Southern Illinois — (618) 549-0800