Mounting panels to steel roof. Not as easy as I thought. Help please.

[hammick]

We are building a garage on our property in Montana. It will similar to the photo shown and panels will be on the tall section facing south. Roof pitch is 4/12

AltEstore has suggested I used the Irongrid XR1000 rail mount system but has no advice on attachment brackets.

I am going to call S-5 tomorrow and quiz them down about their RibBracket: http://www.s-5.com/clamps/ribbracket/index_5337.cfm#4

I guess I would attach the L-bracket from the XR1000 rail system to the RibBracket. I'm a little concerned the panels would be too far off the roof then.

Our property can get some sizable winds from time to time.

Anybody have better suggestions? Also we have no codes or inspections where I am. I want a same and reliable install though. Can I put the panel wires through the ridge cap without any issues? I want to install the combiner box on one of the trusses or a 2x6 stud.

These are the panels: http://www.altestore.com/store/Solar...r-Panel/p9529/

Roof we are considering: http://ascbp.com/residential/prodDetail4c30.html?id=102

XR1000 rail system: http://www.altestore.com/store/Solar...n-Mill/p11425/



This will give you an idea of what types of winds we can get. Mountains are facing West.

[solarix]

Two basic ways to go on steel roofs.
1) Attach to the steel itself (like those S5! clamps) but the steel roofing needs to be extra well secured to the roof framing.
There are lots of different profiles of steel roofing. S5! products handle almost all of them but there are exceptions out there.
2) Attach through the roof directly to the framing. This is stronger and uses less mounts but if your framing is trusses or rafters, they probably don't align to the corrugations so you are putting penetrations in the valleys. If the framing has horizontal purlins, then you can use straddle blocks that span the corrugations but put the screws through the top of the corrugations where is much less likely to leak.

You look like you get lots of snow. Might want to mount the panels steeper than 4/12.

[hammick]

Two basic ways to go on steel roofs.
1) Attach to the steel itself (like those S5! clamps) but the steel roofing needs to be extra well secured to the roof framing.
There are lots of different profiles of steel roofing. S5! products handle almost all of them but there are exceptions out there.
2) Attach through the roof directly to the framing. This is stronger and uses less mounts but if your framing is trusses or rafters, they probably don't align to the corrugations so you are putting penetrations in the valleys. If the framing has horizontal purlins, then you can use straddle blocks that span the corrugations but put the screws through the top of the corrugations where is much less likely to leak.

You look like you get lots of snow. Might want to mount the panels steeper than 4/12.

Thanks for the info. Roof is engineered trusses space two feet. I'm on the East face of the mountains and get a lot less snow then people on the west face. What snow we do get is dry and blows off quickly.

[emartin00]

S-5! is definitely the leader when it comes to metal roof attachments. They're a pretty small company, but they really know their metal roofing.

[hammick]

Thanks. I was on the phone with the S-5 tech guy for quite a while this morning. I'm looking at their RibBrackets in combination with their SP-5 mount/grounding attachments. I would need to upgrade to 26 gauge steel to have a comfort level for my area but this would make the install so much easier.