National Coatings Blog

Protecting your roof against the sun's damaging UV rays can prevent asphalt deterioration, lengthening the lifespan of your roof. Installing a roof coating system specifically designed for asphalt roof maintenance or restoration will prohibit the roof from premature aging and failures that lead to water penetrating inside the building.

What Asphalt Coatings Do You Recommend?

The AcryShield A503 base coat is designed for restoring asphalt. It is a one component, waterborne coating with exceptional wet adhesion properties specifically designed to tenaciously adhere to asphalt. This coating provides superior protection against ponded water and eliminates the need for a costly roof replacement. The AcryShield A400 is an excellent coating to use for the top coat of an asphalt roof coating system as this coating has unique “bleed blocking” properties, protecting asphalt bleed through from occurring. The A400 provides UV protection, longevity and brightness – offering energy savings and a cooler ambient air temperature inside the building. A400 also exceeds several ASTM D6083 requirements such as tensile strength, elongation, wet adhesion and weatherability.

These coatings can be used in our maintenance systems, restoration systems and even in new construction applications to provide outstanding protection from premature aging, greatly extending your roofs’ lifespan. Read our Life Cycle Cost Analysis Using Roof Coatings article for more information or download our FREE Asphalt Roof Coating Guide.

Our AcryShield® asphalt roof coating systems have been successfully used to protect and prolong Built-Up (BUR), Modified Bitumen or Mod Bit and Asphalt roofs since the early 1980's. The coatings in these systems are specially designed to resist water infiltration, bleed through effects of exposed asphalt, and UV degradation. Our systems specialize in high reflectivity and emissivity allowing them to create a cool roof surface which protects your roof from the rigors of the hot sun. These Cool Roof Systems prolong the lifespan of your roof and provide a cooler environment inside the building with less HVAC usage, ultimately lowering your energy cooling costs.

Wondering How Asphalt Roofs Wear Out?

Asphalt and modified bitumen deteriorate because of two environmental factors: ultra-violet radiation and heat from the sun. Consider a simple analogy where a piece of thin gauge sheet metal is constantly bent back and forth until it cracks. The same happens on a molecular level by the UV damaging the bonds of the asphalt molecules. The degradation process is accelerated by the heat from the sun, as heat makes chemical reactions happen faster. The heat also causes the "light fractions", liquid asphalt components that act as plasticizers, to leach out making the resulting material more brittle. 

You Can Protect Your Asphalt Roof

Protecting your roof against the sun's damaging UV rays and heat can prevent asphalt deterioration. This is why one of the three Cool Roof Coating Systems mentioned above are recommended: AcryShield Roof Management (ARM) System, AcryPly Roofing System or AcryShield SPF Roofing System over the asphalt based product. Our AcryShield A503 base coat is ideal for asphalt because it is a one component, waterborne coating with unique wet adhesion properties specifically designed to asphalt, allowing for superior protection against ponded water and eliminating the need for a costly roof replacement. National Coatings has several top coats for asphalt roofing that contain unique properties to solve your buildings exact needs. These top coats offer a wide range of benefits including: bleed-blocking capabilities; coatings for areas where extra levels of low temperature flexibility are required (areas that drop below 0˚F); zero VOCs; ultra high reflectivity; excellent tensile strength, elongation and wet adhesion; and products that exceed all ASTM D6083 requirements. 

Roof life can be greatly extended by protecting the asphalt, modified bitumen or BUR by using National Coatings' AcryShield products. The earlier the roof is coated in its service life, the longer the roof lifespan and the lower the life cycle costs will be. Read our Life Cycle Cost Analysis Using Roof Coatings article for more information.

Contact us to find the ideal asphalt roof coating system and roofing products to meet your roofs specific needs!

   Asphaltic roofs with emulsion are excellent at waterproofing your roof membrane. These roofs are applied across thousands of roofs in America and have been proven to be very successful. With all roofs, there comes a time when aging and failures begin to occur, at this time, we recommend apply an asphalt coating system to renew and restore these roofs, allowing you to avoid a costly tear-off.

Asphalt roofing with emulsion can be difficult to adhere to because of its chemical make-up that gives it the ability to resist water; therefore, it is helpful to know a few ways to test how well the asphalt coating will adhere in order to insure proper and complete adhesion. 

1. (For new construction only) Make sure the asphalt emulsion is completely dried. The surface may feel dry but make sure beneath the surface where the asphalt meets the existing roof is dry. This may take a day or two. Other factors to consider are weather conditions. Heavy dew, fog, rain, humidity, etc… will cause the asphalt to dry at a slower rate. If the asphalt doesn’t get proper adhesion to the roof surface, you will have adhesion issues going forward.
2. Many asphalt emulsions contain large amounts of emulsifiers and surfactants. These ingredients have a tendency to come to the surface and cause the rooftop to be soapy and slippery when wet. Test a small area by applying a few drops of water to the roof and rubbing around with your finger. If the water turns black and feels slippery, then you know your roof contains too much residual “soaps” for proper adhesion. A pressure washer is great at removing the soap from the rooftop but you need to make sure to flush all the water off of the roof without allowing it to collect and/or dry in ponded areas as adequate adhesion can not occur with the soap between the asphalt and the coating layers.
3. Once all the soap is rinsed properly off the building, a simple spot test with water drops and your finger (as described above in #2) should be conducted again to ensure the pressure wash removed all the soapy materials. If the test shows soap again, another pressure wash of the entire roof surface is necessary.
4. After the washing is complete and the spot test shows there is no more soap then a final field test is conducted on a dry asphalt surface. Take a piece of 1 inch masking tape about 5 to 6 inches long and press firmly onto the surface. Pull it back at a 180˚ angle. If the tape has satisfactory adhesion, then it will not peel away easily and will not contain dirt, degraded asphalt or other materials that would cause interference with proper adhesion.

When you’ve completed the few steps above and are left with a clean piece of tape that had good adhesion to the asphalt surface, you are ready to apply the asphalt coating system knowing that proper adhesion will be achieved. Get more information on our asphalt coating systems.  These systems can be applied on a new asphalt roof for added protection and energy savings, and on older systems for renewal and roof life extension.