Solar Roof Mounts: mounting structures for inclined or flat roof

Solar Roof Mounts are used to install solar panels on an inclined or flat roof. These mounting structures are usually made of aluminum or stainless steel.

What are Solar Roof Mounts?

Solar Roof Mounts, as the name suggests, is a mechanism with which the PV Panels can be installed upon the roof. In an area which is populated with short trees or buildings, this may be the best possible installation. This could be achieved either by running aluminum or stainless steel rails along the roof and then attaching the panels to those rails, or by placing multiple brackets on the roof top, at certain distances, and attaching the panels to those brackets. [caption id="attachment_4900" align="aligncenter" width="700"] Flat Roof Mounts[/caption]

Disadvantage Solar Roof Mounts

Roof penetration

One disadvantage of using Roof Mount structures is that it requires penetration through the roof which may result in leaks and dampness. Roof mounted structures typically keep the wire run distances between the solar array and the battery bank or inverter to a minimum, but require roof penetrations and run danger of causing roof leakages, thus the roof must be well sealed.

Roof loading capacity

Also, there is only a certain number of panels which you could install upon the roof depending upon the loading capacity and structural strength of the roof.

Roof orientation

Another disadvantage of roof mounted structures can come up if the roof orientation and angle is not optimal, thus wasting lots of potential energy that your system could generate. For optimal system efficiency using a roof mounted structure you need to ensure that there is no shadow from trees or other buildings in the “optimally free “ airflow path of your solar panels. Moreover, according to 690-5 of the US National Electrical Code-NEC they require expensive ground fault protection (GFP).