Not so long ago, such an architectural refinement as the glass roof of a house could be imagined and seen only in individual skyscrapers, expensive hotels, large greenhouses or museums. The glass pyramid in front of the Louvre in Paris is probably the most famous all-glass building in the world, representing essentially a solid glass roof without walls and internal load-bearing structures.
However, now construction technologies have stepped so far ahead compared even to the technologies of a decade ago that glass roofs have ceased to be an insanely expensive curiosity and are already available to an increasing circle of owners of country houses and summer cottages.
And, as expected, the reduction in the cost of technology leads to its popularization.
Now transparent gable roof above your head is no longer exotic - cozy winter gardens, artists' workshops, glass-covered verandas and terraces are increasingly found in country estates and cottages.
Features of operation of translucent roofs
In addition to its unusual and attractive aesthetic properties, a glass roof has a number of operational nuances that can be attributed to disadvantages:
- in the summer sunny time, such a structure turns into a greenhouse - the energy of the sun passes completely into the room, heating it to tropical temperatures. Therefore, additional measures are needed to isolate from penetrating sunlight in the summer;
- glass structure hip roof it is impossible to make a “ledge”, like slate or tiled, overlapping the lower ones with the top row. Therefore, additional measures are needed to waterproof all seams and joints;
- glass overhead, whether we like it or not, is a source of increased danger to those who are under it. This means that it is necessary to use a glass that does not produce fragments with cutting edges when broken;
- like any other glass construction, the roof has the unpleasant property of losing transparency due to the usual dust settling on the outside of the glass. Therefore, when designing, consider that the glass roof must be made comfortable enough for regular washing.
Materials for transparent roofs
I think it is quite obvious that the materials for translucent structures, such as a do-it-yourself hipped non-standard roof, will differ in their strength and thermal insulation characteristics from materials for a traditional roof.
Glass is a more fragile material than metal, slate or ondulin.
In addition, in order to preserve the transparency of the entire structure (and it was for the sake of transparency that we started everything), we cannot use traditional roof insulation and waterproofing technologies, which means that it is necessary that the installed double-glazed windows and frame profiles themselves provide sufficient heat. and waterproofing.
Your attention! Particular attention should be paid to the correct choice of profiles, which determine the strength and characteristics of the entire structure as a whole.
To build the frame of the future glass roof, the following materials are used:
- Aluminum profile. Provides high frame strength with low weight, which reduces the load on the supporting structures, increasing the reliability of the entire system as a whole. The disadvantage of aluminum is its high thermal conductivity, which increases heat loss through the roof.
- Steel profile. It has the highest strength and can carry the largest glazing area. The disadvantage is the rather large mass of the frame and the susceptibility of steel (even treated with anti-corrosion compounds) to corrosion. For this reason, steel structures require regular maintenance.
- Aluminum-wood profile. The combination of aluminum and wood to create a profile for the frame of glass roofs allows you to use the advantages of both materials: the strength and lightness of aluminum and the heat-insulating and decorative properties of wood.The main disadvantage of this profile is the inability to use it for glazing greenhouses with an imitation of a tropical humid climate. Even treated with special compounds, the tree begins to rot over time and needs to be replaced.
Advice! It is strictly not allowed to use for the construction of a frame for a transparent roof the metal-plastic profile familiar to us, which is used for facade windows. It is not able to provide the necessary structural strength.
The maximum that can be done to give the greenhouse a unified wall and roof design is to use plastic lining.
Double-glazed windows and their substitutes
For roof glazing, only single-chamber double-glazed windows are used, since double-glazed windows, although they provide much better thermal insulation, still have too much mass to be used instead of a roof.
For security purposes, in such double-glazed windows, the outer glass is tempered, and the inner glass is triplex. Such a combination doubles the cost of double-glazed windows compared to conventional glass, but the safety is worth it.
A very interesting option is the use of structural double-glazed windows with a larger outer glass than the inner one. Such double-glazed windows are mounted on a special profile using a frost-resistant adhesive-sealant without the use of external clamping strips.
The result is a smooth glass surface without external elements, which has a very original look.
In addition, this design does not retain snow and rain at all. A house with a glass roof of this type always attracts attention with its high-tech design.
In the event that a translucent roof is not required to be completely transparent, but simply needs to provide additional overhead lighting, polycarbonate panels are often used instead of double-glazed windows.
Such panels are distinguished by high strength (16 mm panel can easily withstand a blow from a sledgehammer) and frost resistance.
Your attention! When using polycarbonate, it must be taken into account that it has a very significant coefficient of thermal expansion. Therefore, when installing sheets, leave gaps between the edge of the sheet and the frame of at least 5 mm.
Design nuances
When designing translucent roofs, it is imperative to provide for ways to deal with icing and snow drifts on the roof. A more expensive and reliable way is to use glass heating systems - in this case, you are guaranteed a clear sky over your head.
A cheaper way is to increase the angle of the roof slope to thirty or more degrees. At the same time, its cost also increases due to the increase in area, but not as significantly as in the first variant.
In many European projects, the glass roof of the greenhouse has a reverse slope towards the house. In Russian conditions, such a scheme is not applicable - the mass of snow, accumulating in a hollow, will gradually push through any structure.
An important point in the creation of glass roofs is to ensure reliable waterproofing of the junction of the structure with the rest of the roof.
One of the most common waterproofing methods is to cover the roof with glass isol as an insulating material.To figure out how to cover the roof with glass isol and provide waterproofing of the joints, you need to know the structure of the glass isol.
Stekloizol is a fiberglass fabric coated on both sides with a bituminous polymer and on the upper side covered with coarse-grained backfill. Like ordinary roofing felt, glass insulation is overlapped and fused by heating with a blowtorch.
Advice! Before covering the roof with glass insulation, it is necessary to ensure that the frame of the glass roof is securely fastened to the truss frame of an ordinary roof or to the wall of the building. Then the glass isol is overlapped by 10 cm on the structure and fused to it.
In this case, it is necessary to warm it up gradually in order to prevent overheating and cracking of the double-glazed window.
After reading this article, you will have an idea of what a glass roof is and how to arrange it.
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