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[–] 1 point 11 months ago (1 child)

snow load

Now I am kinda curious about how heavy snow can get.

I live in a snow-less flat-roofed region and the load capacity seems to be ~1.5 kN/m² ^[https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/simply-supported-slabs-load-capacity-d_1803.html]. So, even the cheapest compliant (maybe I should be checking govt. docs for compliance values) building not designed for snowfall should be able to manage 15cm of rain/snow.

Well, that is much lower than the 1m of snow that I would expect building up in case it really snows and it could get higher considering the parapet walls tend to ~1m high.

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  • [–] 1 point 11 months ago (1 child)

    Snow itself can get pretty heavy, but more risky I think is repeated melting and refreezing. You can wind up with a large mass of ice that can really fuck up a roof or overhang.

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  • [–] 0 points 11 months ago

    Well, I have seen drains clog up so bad that the parapets act like a bowl and capture the ~1m of water with the roof still staying mostly intact (although seepage would have greatly increased there), so something other than my calculations is holding up that roof.

    So I guess one would have to rely on the melting-refreezing to break down the roof, considering that without the phenomenon, the ice would be pretty fluffy and light.

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