Fortifying coastal roofs with COASTALUME™

By Anna Lockhart.  

This innovative building material was created in collaboration between U.S. Steel and Dupont™ Tedlar® to provide coastal homes and commercial buildings an added layer of protection against the harsh elements of coastal life.  

In a recent Lunch & Learn, host Heidi J. Ellsworth visited with Corynn Sheridan of Dupont™ Tedlar® and Mark Carlisle of U.S. Steel to talk about their latest collaborative product launch, COASTALUME™. This new release marks a major innovative leap for contractors working on coastal properties, as the material is the first GALVALUME® product to be specially designed to outlast the tropical weather and elements commonly plaguing coastal environments.  

By using the superior U.S. Steel GALVALUME® materials as the base, which are then coated with the smartly engineered polyvinyl flouride (PVF) film barrier from Dupont™ Tedlar®, this product is specifically designed to withstand the corrosive nature of saltwater and the ageing effects of high UV exposure commonly seen from coastal sunlight. In this special Lunch & Learn, Corynn and Mark share their insights into the idea behind the product’s creation and how contractors can incorporate it into their product offerings.  

Mark highlighted the coastal market’s need for a steel product designed to withstand the elements of a coastal environment, a need which the COASTALUME™ product aims to meet. “[Salt water] is extremely corrosive, we see a very high salinity in the air from breaking surf. And we know that that atmosphere can corrode steel 10 times faster than a normal environment inland, essentially. And that's why we designed this coastal steel system to resist the elements of a demanding coastal environment... COASTALUME™ is North America's first licensed GALVALUME® product that's warranted and designed for coastal environments,” he explained.  

In creating a high-quality PVF film, contractors have looked to Dupont™ Tedlar® for over five decades to deliver reliable solutions that increase their building material durability and lifespan. With COASTALUME™, the film adds a highly durable single-layer coating to the steel that protects it from the elements. “It does not require that three-coat system that you so often see by the beach. And the PVF molecule inherently provides excellent corrosion resistance and excellent flexibility. It's also very, very inert over time. So, what that means is it's not reacting with corrosive elements. It, because of the flexibility, is not cracking on tight bends,” Corynn shared. 

“So, any profile that you make that you need to fabricate to, it's not going to crack on those bends. You're not going to see pinhole issues with the film the way you might with a coating. And it also doesn't chalk and fade. We've got 20 plus years of South Florida testing as well as those 50 years of real-world testing. And you can truly hold up freshly made Tedlar film right next to an aged building, and the color change is indistinguishable,” she explained. And the benefits don’t stop there. Corynn continued, "It rinses clean in the rain. You could wash graffiti off it. Mold and mildew don't grow on it. It just really is not reacting to anything and it's essentially self-cleaning, low maintenance, no change over time.” 

By partnering and bringing together their superior technologies, the two companies have created the ideal steel roofing and siding product for coastal home and business owners all around the country.  

Read the transcript or Watch the webinar to learn more about COASTALUME™. 

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