Snow Sliding Off Solar Panels Damage Gutters

Position the rain gutter right.

Snow sliding off solar panels damage gutters.

Ideally snow and ice should melt and run through a guttering system but constant subfreezing temperatures tend to hinder that process. The higher the roof pitch the more often the snow slides off. Generally you want snow birds or some such device to keep the snow on the roof as it melts and or break it up as it falls by. The issue with snow on solar panels unlike asphalt shingles is that the glass surface of the panels can accumulate a foot or more of snow that can very suddenly break free in its entirety because of the slippery surface causing an avalanche.

Perhaps the only saving grace there will be the fake dormer which might break up the bulk of any slide. I have a fairly large 40 panel array and the snow load on that size array can be over 10 000 lbs. Every year the snow and ice slipping down from one of our viewers roofs does great damage to their rain gutters. All of this cold snow and ice can wreak havoc on gutters.

It depends on how close the solar is to the edge of the roof. And your gutters will still be useful. As a result ice and snowpack can build up inside the gutters which produce additional weight on the gutter sections and the fasteners that hold them. Every time the garage door opened to let a car in or out a huge avalanche of snow spilled off the first row of panels and slid over the eave right onto the incoming or outgoing car.

The panels stop approximately one foot up the roof from the gutter. Some leaf guards though will often keep the snow from snagging on the gutter as it slides by. The concern lies with the roof on the right. It is likely that the guttering itself is either unsuitable for the conditions or is not securely fitted to the property.

Snow damage is a common occurrence on properties without solar panels on them. Sometimes large amounts of snow will slide off your solar panels all at once which can damage your property. The rain gutter should be installed a bit lower down so it is not directly in the path of the sliding snow and the metal roof should hang almost halfway over the gutter. How to stop it.

Slopes greater than 6 12 will tend to shed snow regardless of the texture of the material on them so roof slopes should be configured to avoid shedding anywhere people might be walking or exiting. In this article we will discuss solar snow guards what they do and why you might want to ask your solar installer to include them in your solar array. Their customer had a pv solar system mounted on his metal panel roof but the solar panels were creating a dangerous snow and ice problem.