These are commercial buildings with wide, near-level roof fields, equipment sitting on them, and a cooling season that runs most of the year. A reflective surface over that much area is doing real work, and a weldable seam is worth having on a roof that will be opened again the next time a unit is replaced.
(214) 807-0414Request an assessmentTPO membrane
TPO membrane roofs, in North Texas settings.
Heat-welded white membrane on low-slope commercial roofs. The weld is the roof, so the laps are what get checked.
The system
What tpo membrane is, and where it is the wrong answer.
TPO is a thermoplastic single-ply membrane laid over insulation on a low-slope roof and joined by hot-air welding. Heat fuses two sheets into one material rather than sticking them together, which is why a seam can be probed for continuity and remade later with the same equipment. The sheet is commonly reflective white.
TPO is chosen as a category when it is really three decisions: the sheet, the insulation under it, and how the assembly is held down. Two estimates naming TPO can describe different roofs. It also has no useful resistance to grease, so a field downwind of a kitchen exhaust fan is the wrong place.
What an assessment looks at on this system
01
The welds. A seam is probed along its length rather than looked at, because a weld made cold or skipped altogether is invisible from above and will not announce itself until it opens.
02
Every interruption: curbs, drains, pipe boots and equipment mounts. Field membrane rarely fails first, and the failures gather wherever the sheet stops being flat.
03
The routes people walk. Where technicians cross the roof to reach the units is where the sheet wears, and a roof with no walkway layout has one anyway — it is simply unmarked.