EPDM Liquid roof starting to get shallow cracks.

[kahoona]

Hi
This might have been covered here but I could not search it out so please share your experience.
About five years ago we coated out 8 year old EPDM roof on our Class A Coachmen with Liquid Rubber EPDM coating. It worked great. Adhered well, stuck fast and looked great. We also used Eternabond on all the seams. Very nice. The RV stays outside here in south FL although there is some shade it gets hot. I went up to clean and inspect the roof a few months ago and it is now covered in small shallow cracks. This is what the original roof did. It is not leaking at all as far as I can tell. I don't want to wait for a leak. What is the best way to prevent leaks?
I did email the Liquid Roof folks but I pretty well know that they will sell me more liquid roof and that might be a good answer but I know you folks will give me the straight poop so to speak.
Thanks
Rob

[John_Joey]

If it was me, I would have been a little upset. That is a fair amount of money and effort to only get 5 service years out of. There is a lot of good Elastomeric coatings that would have given you that much lifespan.

I would call the company and tell them what is going on. If they are worth their salt, they should have the answers you're looking for. If you do, post back your results so others can make an informed choice when it comes time to redo their roof.

[kahoona]

We poured it on because the old one was going. I had patched a few spots already and the original was starting to crack in places. Although it was still holding water it was shot. The liquid rubber roof has lasted five years and might last longer but I don't know how to judge it. It is still stuck on tight. I figure that their 10 year life expectancy was for vehicles kept inside in a neutral climate with a perfect application so I am not upset about the five year life so far. It might last longer. I was wondering if anyone had any experience with this condition. Do I need to do something soon? Is there an alternative to a complete re coat? There is no mess and no need to tear anything off, it just has a lot of surface cracking like old rubber often gets. Worse case is that I have to recoat.

[dclark1946]

Another coat and another 5 years. How much longer to you plan on keeping your RV?

Dick

[John_Joey]

Thank you for doing your post and explaining what is happening.

I'm guessing that the liquid roof people figure 20 years for the original roof, then 10 years for the pour. At this point the RV is 30 years old and in the junk yard. I'm betting they never expected to hit THEIR lifetime limit on their product.

Again thanks for the post. To be forewarn is to be foretold. It might make some postpone pouring that stuff on their roof thinking that they are being pro-active.

[donn0128]

I think your first mistake was painting liquid roof over a sound rubber roof. Now your stuck with a real mess. You might consider stripping everything back to bare wood and have a spray on coating applied. I see one of the high end fifth wheel builders is offering rhinos coating as an option. There are at least two threads on this subject in the recent past on here.