Solar Panel comes off roof.

[Mrcoolabah1au]

Yes mine bolted not glue been there ten years now

[native pepper]

My panels are riveted and glued to the roof, they also have a deflector in front of the panels so no wind gets underneath them.

[T1 Terry]

Yes mine bolted not glue been there ten years now

Don't you have a water leak problem Wayne? .... just saying

T1 Terry

[T1 Terry]

My panels are riveted and glued to the roof, they also have a deflector in front of the panels so no wind gets underneath them.

The rivets might hold the bracket in place while the glue dries, but so do the multiple milk bottles we use to spread the weight evenly allowing the roof to retain its normal shape and the Armourflex to fill in the hollows and thin out a bit on the peaks where needed. Until you put long sections of aluminium angle along or across the roof, you don't realise just how uneven the roof on an RV is .... of they built busses and cars like that they'd never sell them but I guess very few people actually see the roof of their RV so they can get away with it being a bit rough .....

T1 Terry

[supersparky]

Yes mine bolted not glue been there ten years now

Don't you have a water leak problem Wayne? .... just saying

T1 Terry

Thats just one of the problems typically encountered when you have an EPDM rubber roof Winnebago as well.
Ask me how I know

[T1 Terry]

Yes mine bolted not glue been there ten years now

Don't you have a water leak problem Wayne? .... just saying

T1 Terry

Thats just one of the problems typically encountered when you have an EPDM rubber roof Winnebago as well.
Ask me how I know

Ummm..... don't attempt to mount the panels straight on the Winnie/Avida roof, there is next to nothing there to hold them on. Under that rubber skin is the thinnest sheet of 3 ply I've ever seen, then polystyrene, then aluminium for the ceiling inside so at least there is something to hang the inside lights from so they don't fall off. Can't remember if the air gap is between the aluminium and polystyrene or the 3 ply and the polystyrene ..... I had a core sample here from Vic's Avida but I think the cleaning fairy might have thrown it out ......
The only safe way to mount panels on one of these roofs is the curved aluminium frame from side to side with legs to mount to the 40mm hollow square section that runs up each side of the roof.
Somewhere on here is the photos of the solar frame we had to build for Vic's solar array so we could work around the hatches and roof top rattler yet leave a path up the centre to get to the rattler and clean the panels ......
We bought a special pipe roller that we modified to roll the 20mm sq tube (might be 25mm) to make the required curve across the roof so the panels remain above the rubber roof

T1 Terry

[supersparky]

I'm not sure about the newer models but on the old ones there is an aluminium sort of space frame that the ply and styrene foam insulation are stuck to, sort of like a lattice. The frame is what creates the airgap, and it takes the weight of the roof rattler etc. As you say, there isn't much to anchor to, but whoever put the panels on the roof of ours about 14 years ago must have had a bit of a clue as the aluminium rails are still secure. In the near future when I upgrade our solar I know I need to source panels with the same footprint.

[Shirley]

Suppose when you only mount solar cells with these fancy glues, the very important part is making sure that the surface that you are mounting to has been totally cleaned so as same adheres totally, guess if they were only mounted to a painted surface then the fixture is only as strong as the paint holds on to that surface.

[supersparky]

That's about it in a nut shell Shirley. It is all in the preparation. Do it once, do it well. If only some of the manufacturers would do the same........

[jon_d]

And the 2 surfaces need to be separated by about 3 mm.
This allows the glue to fill the void and some elasticity.