In Golden, Colorado, it’s not uncommon for the area to see a great deal of snowfall — 84 inches annually, to be exact. 

To keep employees, visitors and passersby safe from falling snow at the town’s new Water Treatment Facility, a snow retention system from S-5 was installed on the metal roof.

The general contractor for the project, RN Civil Construction in Centennial, Colorado, used the snow retention calculator on the S-5 website, which helped determine the company’s DualGard as the best system for the job.

“We plugged in the information — the roof surface, slope and dimensions, and the allowable load — and it spit out what we needed,” said Bret Gellrein, project manager at RN Civil Construction. “It made the whole process easier. We knew we were going to need something a little beefier in this area. The engineers were pleased with the numbers, and it looks great. Everyone is pleased with the result.”

Lori Hanson, an architect with Greenwood Village, Colorado-based Eidos Architects, said using the calculator was one of the first steps in designing the water treatment facility.

“When we know we’ll be using snow retention, we start with the calculator,” she said. “It helps us during the bidding process, providing the most accurate information. It lets us know what we’ll need for the project and what our costs will be.”

Jim Davis, project manager at MB Sheet Metal in Commerce City, Colorado, installed the standing-seam metal roofing as well as the new DualGard snow retention system from S-5. The roof required 11,500 square feet of 16-inch double lock 1 ½-inch standing seam in medium bronze. Panels were formed on-site with coil from Sheffield Metals. MB Sheet Metal also installed the flush metal soffit panels.

“This was our first time working with DualGard,” Davis said. “We’ve installed a lot of ColorGard, but this was the first time with DualGard. We found great directions on the S-5 website, so once we started it was just fine.”

Four rows of DualGard were installed — 600 linear feet in all — which easily met snow load requirements for the Denver suburb. The project was completed in March 2017.