Extending Your Living Space: Waterproof Awnings

With the onset of summer, it is a wise idea to let your indoors partly extend to the outdoors. This among other benefits encourages your children to play outside in the shade and also de-clutters your living room as you can put some of the tightly-squeezed furniture outside. Waterproof awning helps you achieve this and much more. In Singapore much as in any other country, waterproof awnings act like a secondary covering or an overhang that is attached to the exterior wall of a building and as the name suggests are used to provide protection against vagaries of nature.

Waterproof awnings are typically made of canvas material that is woven from acrylic, cotton, vinyl laminated, polyester yarn or polyester fabric. Waterproof awning made of polycarbonate has also become popular in Singapore due to its effectiveness in providing shelter from occasional rains and harmful UV rays. This canvas material is then stretched tightly over a light structure support by steel, wood or iron beams.

Waterproof awnings can be placed above windows or doors where they deter water from entering a housing structure especially during stormy rains. Additionally, waterproof awning can be placed along the walls of a building such as a restaurant or a business which serves to extend outdoor are to indoor area. When use as such waterproof awnings are then referred to as canopies. However, canopy use in Singapore is not restricted to restaurant or business use only, home owners also use it to extend their patio or decks.

Given the fact that Singapore is a region that experiences heavy monsoon rains, most home owners and business people usually opt for awning that will remain waterproof for many years. Among the top materials used are canvas and acrylic. A canvas awning is a good waterproof awning due to the fact that the fibers used to manufacture it tends to swell when wet. Thus it creates an impervious barrier that acts as a water repellent thus making rain penetration impossible. However, after a period of time, the canvas will dry out regaining its normal structure.

Awnings made of acrylic, unlike canvas do not attribute their waterproof aspect to the swelling of fibers but rather due to chemical treatment. Chemical treatment incorporates the use of fluorocarbon agents. However, waterproof awning that has been used for prolonged periods, usually over ten or so years, will show signs of water penetration and in such a case will need the application of a reproofing agent.

For canvas awnings, water-repelling reproofing agent can either be petroleum or water-based. They act as sealants to the microscopic hole gathered in the waterproof awning, now no longer waterproof, over a period of time. For acrylic awnings, floropolymer-based products are the best as opposed to reproofing products made of silicone. This is due to the simple reason that the fluorocarbon is used in the original treatment of the acrylic awnings will tend to repel silicone of contained in these reproofing products. Rather like mixing water and oil.

Despite these, experience has shown that with normal use and proper care being extended to all types of awnings, they will tend to last longer, and thus waterproof, without the need to reproof.