Modified Bitumen Roofing in San Antonio

Modified bitumen is a bitumen-based membrane reinforced with polyester or fiberglass mat - the successor technology to built-up roofing (BUR). The downtown San Antonio commercial inventory, the Westside masonry buildings near the historic districts, and the mid-century institutional buildings around the UTSA Downtown campus at 501 W Cesar Chavez carry decades of modified bitumen and BUR history. Many of these buildings have been reroofed two or three times - each cycle adding a recover layer over the previous system, with the original BUR still somewhere in the assembly.

We execute torch-applied and self-adhered modified bitumen installations, and we navigate the recover decisions on these layered-history buildings with straightforward analysis. The question is always: how many layers are currently on the deck, what is the total weight, and what does the deck's dead-load capacity allow? When the answer is that the deck cannot support another recover layer, the scope is tear-off and replacement - with the weight history documented for the permit application.