Solar Southwest Florida

S-5! Clamp

After years of seemingly nothing but tile roofs being installed in Southwest Florida, metal roofs are getting popular again. The longevity, durability, and energy efficiency of metal roofs are great selling points, and they look great, coming in many profiles and colors.

The metal roof is known for protecting roofs against leaks, and minimizing penetrations is very important for roof warranties and customer peace of mind. There is an aluminum clamp called an S-5! that attaches solar panels to the standing seam of metal roofs without penetrating the metal.

The strength of these clamps is amazing. Test results on many roof profiles indicate that they can withstand wind uplift exceeding 1,000 pounds per clamp in many cases. Depending on the wind loads in our particular solar panel design, enough clamps  can be used to ensure a safe and effective solar panel attachment. With required design wind speeds in Southwest Florida ranging from 120 mps – 150 mph, wind uplift is an important design factor.

Of course, it is important that the metal roof is installed properly, and meets the requirements of the panels that will be mounted on them. If the roof panels are installed to meet the 2007 Florida Building Code, it is almost certain that there will be no issue with using S-5! clamps. Older installations should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

Typical S-5 Attachment Design

The clamp comes in a variety of shapes and sizes to meet the requirements for just about every metal seam profile. There is even a clamp that allows you to attach a solar electric module directly to the metal seams without the use of aluminum rails. However, this clamp is incompatible with new microinverter technology because microinverters must have something on which to mount.

While the S-5! clamps do not work on some metal roofs, like those with 5V or sinusoidal profiles (corrugated metal roofs), the standing seam metal roof profile is quickly becoming popular around the area on both homes and businesses. If you have a metal roof and don’t want to penetrate it to attach solar panels, take a look at S-5! clamps!

Fafco Solar’s next solar water heating project for the Southwest Florida Affordable Housing Choice Foundation is in Cape Coral at the Coconut Apartments. Each of the two multi-tenant buildings have four dwelling units with three 2′x8′ solar water heating collectors per unit. Installation of the solar panels just started, and here’s the day one picture of the first building. Like the Broadway Apartments project, the panels are mounted on rails attached to the standing seam metal roof with non-penetrating S-5 clamps.

This construction site is just a stone’s throw from the Fafco Solar office and warehouse, making this one of the most convenient solar water heating jobs we’ve worked on!

Solar Panels on South Roof

Can you spot anything wrong with this photo?

Skylight installation means cutting a hole in your roof. Sound scary? It’s not if you know how a solar tubular skylight is installed!

The flashing for a tubular skylight dome is slipped under the shingles and the waterproofing layer on a typical shingle roof. Once the proper sized hole is cut in the shingles and roof sheathing, the shingles are further trimmed to go neatly over the top half of the wide flange around the housing. Sealant is used under the flange as a secondary barrier to water penetration.

Flashing for a solar tubular skylight dome installed on a shingle roof.

The lower half of the flashing sits atop the shingles and waterproofing. Water flowing around the housing is directed over the lower courses of shingles, keeping moisture where it belongs!

Early morning dew covers PV panels at Naples Botanical Gardens

Fafco Solar has completed the FGCU Naples Botanical Garden photovoltaic system installation. I am particularly proud of this system and the expert installers that did the heavy lifting. The system includes 164 SolarWorld 245 watt solar photovoltaic modules, 164 Enphase M215 microinverters, a Unirac SolarMount mounting system, and S-5! Clamp attachments.

Because of the existing electrical system at the facility, the photovoltaic system is divided into two sub-arrays backfeeding power into two 208V 3-Phase electrical distribution panels. Commercial 3-Phase installations are always interesting from a design standpoint because typically we are dealing with various existing transformers and often generator backup systems.

Workers Install PV Module

It was truly a pleasure working with the Naples Botanical Garden staff and Manhattan Kraft Construction on this project. The weather cooperated for the most part. The job went very smoothly, finishing about a week ahead of my expectations.

This job is a model for future PV construction projects. We look forward to the next big PV job as we move on to a large multi-tenant solar water heating job in Fort Myers.