Mikael Kuronen - DensDeck® StormX™ Prime Roof Board Stands Up to Very Severe Hail

By Colin Sheehan, RCS Reporter. 

Learn the cutting-edge technology being used for Georgia-Pacific's newest hail-resistant product. 

In a recent episode of Roofing Road Trips, Heidi J. Ellsworth visits with Mikael Kuronen about Georgia-Pacific’s recent launch of DensDeck® StormX™ Prime Roof Board. This high-performing gypsum roof coverboard (patent-pending) is designed to help cc or other extreme weather conditions. Also in this episode, you will hear about the technology behind the new product and several studies with promising results about the product’s effectiveness.  

Mikael is the director of product management for Georgia-Pacific's commercial roofing products and has been with the company for 23 years. He started at GP as an intern while studying chemical engineering at the University of Colorado at Boulder. 

“From there I went to Atlanta to join our corporate consumer products group,” said Mikael. “And then from there I came over to building products in 2013. So, I am not a native of the building products world but have spent the last eight or so years now working in building products. 

DensDeck StormX is one of Mikael’s favorite products to come out of the Georgia-Pacific line up and was designed to meet shifting market-based needs.  

“We looked at StormX as the result of a change in the market,” explained Mikael. “In this case, the market change was the result of FM introducing a new classification for hail-resistance and that was their new extreme Very Severe Hail classification they introduced in 2018.” 

When this new classification came into effect, the severe hail impact resistance nearly quadrupled, compared to previous VSH requirement for roofing systems. To create a roof board solution, Mikael and GP also changed their testing methods, switching from dropping steel balls to launching ice balls at roofs at speeds over 100 miles per hour. 

"It's a very violent test and very challenging to roof systems. So, we quickly were understanding that no current roof systems were meeting this requirement or none of the conventional single-ply assemblies.” 

The new classification has been a challenge for roof systems manufacturers everywhere and was designed in a way where most current roofing systems will not be able pass the test. Even some successful roofing systems that were previously considered hail resistant could not pass the brutal series of tests. 

"When we got that feedback from system manufacturers, and we went out and did some of this testing on our own, we realized this was a big problem and one that really needed to be solved for single-ply systems.” 

Listen to the entire podcast to learn more about DensDeck® StormX™ Prime Roof Board and how it stands up to rigorous VSH testing.