A Guide for Choosing the Right Snow Guard
If you live in a climate where snow is certain each winter, then it’s important to consider how that winter weather will impact your pole building.
Without the right accessory, snow will simply slide off the metal roof of your building and pile up against it, blocking doors and windows, or even causing damage.
Since that’s not a particularly appealing possibility, many people opt to add snow rake or snow cleats to their pole buildings—but which one is right for you?
To help you decide, we’ll break down the details of each option and provide some tips for making your pick.
What Is Snow Rake?
Snow rake (also referred to as snow stops) is essentially a set of metal strips installed on the roof, perpendicular to its slope. Although the design is simple, it’s enough to block the snow from sliding down the roof and accumulating on the ground.
What Are Snow Cleats?
Snow cleats are small plastic accessories that form a right angle. They’re affixed to the roof on one side, which is flat; the other side has a small indentation and faces the roof ridge. When many snow cleats are placed together on a roof, they look like a row of spikes lined up near the eaves.
What Is The Difference Between Snow Rake and Snow Cleats?
Although snow rake and snow cleats are both designed to catch snow before it falls off the roof and causes damage below, they function in different ways.
Snow rake offers a continuous barrier that sits closer to the roof itself, whereas snow cleats offer a more segmented form of protection that sits higher off of the roof, and is therefore more noticeable.
In terms of price, snow rake is less expensive—that’s one of the reasons we recommend it as our preferred method.
Which Option is Better for Your Pole Building?
Either snow rake or snow cleats will help manage snow so it doesn’t create a hazard or inconvenience during the winter months, but at Beehive Buildings we generally prefer to install snow rake.
The only caveat is that we need to know during the building process in order to install snow rake. If you decide that you want snow guard once your building is already completed, snow cleats will be the only option since your pole building will not have the backing necessary to screw in snow rake.
Tips for Choosing The Right Snow Guard
If you’re still uncertain whether you should opt for snow rake or snow cleats, here are some questions to ask yourself that may help.
- How concerned are you about snow?
It’s no secret that many parts of the Intermountain West receive significant snow during the winter months—are you worried about the potential impact of snow sliding off the roof of your building, or would you rather try your luck without snow guard for now?
If snow is an important concern for you right from the start, snow rake is likely the best choice. If you’d rather wait and see if snow becomes a bigger issue, you can always add snow cleats later on.
Fortunately, your pole building is engineered to withstand snow load, so you don’t need to worry about the stress of that snow on your building’s roof.
- How important is the look of your building?
Snow rake is flat and sits closer to the roof, so it’s less noticeable than snow cleats. If you’re looking for a snow guard that won’t impact the overall look of your pole building too heavily, snow rake is an ideal option.
- How tight is your budget?
If you’ve already prioritized other pole building accessories, you may not have extra room in your budget to purchase snow guard right away. You can always decide to make the addition later on, but once your building is completed, snow cleats are the only option.
Preparing Your Building for Snow
You can’t control the weather, but you can control the way that your new pole building reacts to it. Now that you have a clearer idea of how to choose between snow rake and snow cleats, contact us to see how we can bring the pole building you’re envisioning to life!