Roof Slope For Snow

The key factors are usually snow loading requirements adequate slope and the use of snow guards when needed.

Roof slope for snow.

The minimum roof pitch for shedding snow is around 30 or a 6 12 or 7 12 slope although this is not a definite as the material of your roof the direction of the snow and wind are some factors that can affect whether or not snow will slide as roofs of as little as 10 have been reported to shed snow. In general determining the pitch of an existing roof is a simple calculation. Roof slopes are most commonly defined by the rise over run ratio. They would say use a low slope approximately 5 12 and keep the snow on.

One key difference in industry s approach to snow on roofs is that keeping snow on the roof is something that they desire quite the opposite from the trend in north america. If your roof is pitched enter the length and width of the flat area covered by the roof. Run in degrees and as percentage the minimum roof slope allowed by code for any type of roof is in 12 applicable only to coal tar pitch roof systems. Roof pitch multiplier table.

What exactly is roof slope. Flat roofs are common with industrial buildings boasting wide roof spans and are also popular in dry climates for houses where there is no need for the roof to help disperse rain and snow. Even in these arid regions so called flat roofs are still installed with a slight pitch to keep water from pooling on top of the structure. There are some opinions that standing seam metal roof minimum slope is 12 but it increases the possibility of leaking on the few first days of snow arrival.

Complete list of roofing types. Roof slope equivalents as rise. In country with heavy snow and tough winter days the metal roof minimum slope is recommended to be 1 12. If these issues are addressed during the design stage and the roofing contractor does his job these systems will almost always perform as intended.

Intuitively this is the number of inches of snow on your roof in the place where the cover is the thickest. For example a roof with a 6 inch 12 pitch is one where it rises 6 inches vertically for every 12 inches of the horizontal run. I e 4 inches of rise per 12 inches one foot of run. This can be accomplished by measuring the number of inches the roof rises vertically for every 12 inches it extends horizontally.

If a roof slope rises say 4 inches when measured 12 inches along the bottom of a horizontal roof truss the roof slope is said to be 4 12.