Solarium: Similar to a Sunroom, a room built largely of glass to afford exposure to the sun.

Solariums have glass roofs unlike sunrooms. Solariums are designed for warmth,…

…whereas sunrooms are designed for scenic view.
— Wikipedia

And sometimes you achieve the benefits of both!
Not a bad view for a master bedroom, is it?

Failed, foggy glass, water-intrusion and unmanageable heat generation created the motivation for this upgrade.

Low-E Glass means low emissivity, as it relates to the radiant energy (ultraviolet rays) of our sun.

It simultaneously filters out varying degrees of the heat generating & material damaging characteristics of this radiant energy…

…while also helping to keep the warm or cool air created by furnaces and air conditioners to the interior of the building, where & when you want it.

We’ve yet to meet a Solarium or a Sunroom that we couldn’t repair and substantially improve upon.

At the risk of sounding like we’re tooting our own horn, you will likely find that employing our services is a decision that will reflect well upon your judgment for years to come.

A stately property with a sunroom in the S.W. hills overlooking Burnside and nearby properties.

A vinyl sunroom to be exact.

Herein lies the reason for our being called. You might click on the photo if you want to see it a little better.

Tubes, electrical wires & after-market screws were the source of many of the water leaks.

Apparently, someone at some time installed electrified operators to open these roof-hatches for ventilation. See the water draining out from screw-holes made to install the hardware?

Installing the fans on structural components into which water was meant to be channeled back out to the exterior was also probably not the best idea. Our client told us water was pouring out of the fan assembly.

One of the other problems we identified was a lack of proper flashing between the roof-structure shown here, and the upper-most portion of the sunroom structure.

So we had Schmeer Sheet-Metal fabricate some custom flashing to our specifications and tucked it up under the composition roofing and installed it all along this roofline between the sunroom and the house (flashing not shown).

We were surprised how well the roof-hatches were designed to catch and route water back out to the exterior.

As long as you don’t drill holes in them, they’d probably work fine.

It’s somewhat difficult to see it from the street, but the value of this Lake Oswego home is significantly derived…

…from the view on the back side. This photo does not do the view any justice, but the view does help explain…

…the existence of this modest solarium structure & a number of other window structures on the backside

…of this home. Built in the 1980s, this solarium is constructed of your basic aluminum window…

…components and is glazed by means of aluminum snap-bead. It’s amazing that it hasn’t leaked before.

Several insulated glass units had failed (fogged-up) and our client chose to have us up-grade all the insulated glass to the latest 366 Low-E glass to help manage the heat…

…generation and the material fading properties of ultraviolet rays. We did this job in late December in the midst of some cold rain and even more daunting,…

…brisk wind gusts, which as you may be able to imagine, presents more than a little challenge for our crew to wrestle such large insulated glass units up onto a roof…

…without injury to self or damage to the glass. Projects like this in weather like this, tend to remind us of the years and years of cumulative experience and expertise…

…that we’ve garnered. Our crew is quite practiced at dealing with just about any weather contingencies. Even if it involves opening up a roof in the rain.

Foster, Oregon. South East of Albany in the Cascade foothills. Oregon native that I am, and having traveled extensively and camped throughout the State, I still had never even heard of it before this project. To get a slightly better look at this house, you might try clicking on the photo to enlarge it.

Some fairly creative architecture in my humble opinion. The house is 20 years old and time to reglaze the glass in the Pella sunroom roofline.

These are but two of many points of entry where water was beginning to show up on the interior side of the structure.

We spent 9 days in Foster with a three man crew and learned a thing or two about Pella sunroom structures. That’s Foster lake in the background.

Our client wisely allowed us to convince her that the insulated glass should be replaced at this juncture. And so Sean Miller & Phil McNair are shown here in the process of removing the original glass.

After which Sean goes about cleaning off the surfaces upon which the new insulated glass shall sit.

The new insulated glass.

Step one of the new glazing system.

Step two. Pressure bars sitting atop step one after the Polyurethane caulking is applied beneath the step one components.

Of course there are many other steps and other work that our limited number of photos will not allow us opportunity to discuss extensively here, such as the work we were contracted to do to refurbish the Pella windows installed vertically, like these in one of the basement walls, as well as those directly beneath the Pella sunroom roofline windows. Or the Pella skylight glass we replaced.

No, this isn’t a residential project, but we wanted to include it anyway. The Veritable Quandary…what has no doubt become a Portland Icon and landmark.

In fact, V.Q. has been a mainstay of the Downtown Eatery and Refreshment scene for so long that some of the surrounding terrain has begun to show its age. You might gain a better view of the damage on the tree and the size of the limb that detached itself, if you enlarge the photo.

Resulting in the four broken panes of glass and the need for a new gutter.

The laminated wire glass pretty much held together despite the damage, as per design.

As is the idea behind safety glass.

Fortuitously, the event occurred after hours, and no one was hurt.

After removing the damaged glass, our technician Phil prepares the aluminum structure for glazing in the new glass…

…while Brandon carefully oversees the process from his lofty and floral-laden perch.

The replacement glass is carefully lifted up to Steve Hilt for installation. You might enlarge the photo to get a better view of the “wire-glass,” if you so desire.

The pre-lunch-hour, early morning mission is completed; the site cleaned-up and all evidence of our little covert endeavors are removed before the civilians begin to show up, as was the plan. Officially…we were never there.

Lake Oswego. Founded in 1847 and named by Albert Alonzo Durham after Oswego, New York, was incorporated in 1910.

It was the hub of Oregon’s brief iron industry in the late 19th century and is today an affluent suburb of Portland.

We do a lot of work in Lake Oswego, as with many other surrounding Portland & Vancouver communities.

Such as this solarium Reglaze & glass replacement.

We are experts at handling glass. We are what is known as glazers.
A Glazier is a construction professional who selects, cuts, installs, replaces, and removes residential, commercial, and artistic glass

Glaziers also install aluminum storefront frames and entrances, glass handrails and balustrades, shower enclosures, curtain wall framing and glass and mirror walls.

We also know a considerable amount about the differing types of glass.

Not to mention the differing window & door products in which glass is used.

Isn’t it fun to be good at something?

Another happy client.

The first impression is of an extremely small cottage in the Multnomah Village area, until you go around back to discover a daylight basement and a second story bump-out.
To gain a better view, you can click on the photo-collage to enlarge it if you like.

Before we disassembled it, this is what our client’s home-made sunporch looked like. Note the transom-glass which we also removed, cleaned, reinstalled & improved the glazing system with some custom-made aluminum glazing materials (not shown).

A 6′ X 5′ “7-Lite” Sash on one side of the door, and an 8′ X 5′ “18-lite” sash on the other. We were asked to look at replacing the putty-glazing, but the labor component to do so on these truly antique sash would cost more than…

…replacing them with new single-pane, 1 3/8″ thick fir sash. Note the wood-stops rather than putty-glazing, and the simplified Queen-Anne 6-Lite configuration on both of these new sash, shown here in our warehouse in Tigard. New sash by Wooddale; http://wooddalewindows.net/

Our client asked if we would be willing to prime them before we installed them, which we sometimes are willing to do, depending upon several factors. Technicians Bruce & Phil shown here going about masking & priming the new sash.

Ready for installation.

Technician Sean Miller preparing for the installation.

We ended up finding more water-damaged components than we expected, so we ended up rebuilding more of the sub-structure than we expected.

There was some “Change-Order” work on this project. But it translated into a better finished product for our client.

Almost done.

Just one of the many Mountain Park homes that capitalize upon the stunning views from Mt. Sylvania.
In this case, it’s a view from our client’s master bath…

…and shower stall by means of a solarium glass wall. All the expensive glass shower-stall walls & the fiberglass tub are well cared for and protected while we work.

This happened to be one of the few home owners who didn’t wait until they had a leak, to upgrade the flashing and have the glass glazing upgraded.

They also took our recommendation that they let us upgrade their glass with the latest 366-Low-E Insulated Glass.

We completely removed all the original flashing and temporarily removed the aluminum portion of the solarium assembly structure.

We removed some of the roofing as needed and tied in some of the latest flashing membrane materials into the original moisture-barrier.

All the new custom-made flashing & and adjoining custom gutter/flashing structure were made to our specifications…

…by Schmeer Sheet Metal (www.schmeersheetmetal.com).
The original aluminum-frame components are re-installed & the new glass glazed into place.

Roofing materials are replaced as needed.

The finished product.

Literally…better than when it was new.