Boise Towne Square Mall Skylight Replacement

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Skylight Gutters Don’t Always Drain as Originally Intended

Many skylight designers from the 80’s inserted a gutter in-between two barrel vaults. The idea was the skylights were smaller, which cost less, and it was easier to design a structure to support them. Smaller skylights have less loads including thrust and therefore were easier to design curbs to hold that thrust. The problem starts with difficult access not only to the skylight but also to the gutter for necessary maintenance by roofers, etc. Narrow gutters are sometimes impossible to work on and fill with debris and mud which is very problematic.

Solution:

  • In many cases we design a new curb and install one skylight in place of where the two skylights previously were located. This way the gutter is completely eliminated.
  • In this case the mall owner had a budget that only allowed repairing or replacing just the two skylights that were causing issues. They didn’t want to change the appearance of these two as they wanted them to match the other sets.
  • However, we improved the drainage slope of the gutter and applied new one-piece gutter flashing while the skylights were removed and we had access to the gutter.
  • The skylights were replaced as the old ones were beyond repair.

Product Used:

  • American Skylites – Barrel Vault

Results:

  • Leaks were stopped where no one else could solve the problem.
  • The skylights performed as expected and the mall received a “face lift” which pleased the tenants who were tired of the constant dodging of rain drops and dirt that penetrated the old skylight.

Benefits:

  • Higher efficiency skylights—increased energy savings
  •  Healthy, natural daylight in the space with accurate color rendition
  •  No required maintenance — products used in gutter were designed for long life and function better than the original gutter

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