Roofing Shingles Info

Most homes have roofing shingles, but most homeowners don’t spend much time thinking about them. The purpose of roofing shingles are to provide a single layer solution to a leak resistant top for a home or structure.  Roofing shingles are laid out from the bottom edge of the roof upward, with each higher row overlapping the lower row.

Traditionally shingles were made of wood and were capped at the top with a row of copper or lead sheeting.  In modern shingle roofs this cap has been replaced by a row of roofing shingles that includes a plastic underlay.

Back to the make up of roofing shingles, wood was considered good but in time modern materials such as asphalt and asbestos cement replaced wood as common materials. Fiberglass based asphalt shingles are currently the most popular roofing shingle used in the United States. The obvious issue with wood is fire, and fire is the reason wood and paper backed shingles are used infrequently in modern construction.

Most people have seen a special type of wood shingle, but wouldn’t be able to identify it.  This roofing shingle is named a shake, which is a wooden shingle made from split logs.  Shake roofs were common with log cabins, and with many wood frame homes.  They’re still in use today, most commonly transported by helicopters, but it wasn’t always done that way.

Before the invention of helicopters the shakes were tied into packs and transported by pack animal or even by human power.  Often cut in hilly areas, they were carried down the slope with the help of a long line run from the bottom to the top.  This line served as a kind of railing so people carrying the shake packs wouldn’t fall.

The main difference between a shingle and a tile is flexibility.  Tiles are generally made from ceramic.  They’re brittle and ill suited to locations where tree limbs might impact a  roof.  Shingles are flexible and therefore better able to stand up to tree limbs.

Wood shingles rot, while ceramic tiles don’t but modern materials such as the asbestos base for most shingles don’t rot. Another difference is in the shape.  Roofing shingles are flat, while ceramic tiles commonly have an “S” profile to allow them to interlock for strength.

One of the more unique materials for roofing shingles is slate.  Because of both cleavage and grain slate can be easily split into thin sheets.  Such sheets, the slate roofing shingles, make for an old world antique look for a roof.  Slate roofing shingles are installed by a slater, a tradesman trained to work with slate.

The same qualities that make slate excellent for roofing shingles, it is fireproof and an electric insulator, made it useful for early twentieth century switchboards and relay controls on large electric motors used for early 20th century switchboards and relay controls for large electric motors .  Imagine that, making a phone call on your roofing shingles!

Roofing Supplies Required For Roof Repair and Replacement

If you are planning to replace or repair your roof you are going to have to make sure you have al the roofing supplies required at hand. There is nothing worse than setting up the ladders and getting up on the roof only to find you don’t have a set of seaming pliers so you need to stop the job and head back to your roofing supplier.

The term “roofing supplies” covers a wide range of materials and items used for roof construction and maintenance.  This consists of not only shingles but molding, lumber, pipes and vents, roofing cements, ladders and all the required tools including roofing nails.

Starting at the top, let’s consider the roofing material.  This is generally the roof as people see it and includes wood shingles, ceramic tiles, asbestos shingles, metal roofing sheets and tiles, rubber roofing sheets and shingles, and a lot of other types of materials.  Location is a prime concern when selecting roofing material, so that the roof will withstand the local elements and issues that impact a roof.

The frame or support structure of a roof is lumber.  This generally consists of a triangular truss and a lattice of beams.  The frame serves as the base for the roof which is laid over the top.  Lumber is used for other elements including the cornice, part of the frame that overhangs the wall, the fascia, or underside of the cornice, the eave, which allows water to drip away from the roof and the soffit, which is the underside of the eave.

Pipes and vents protrude from the roof.  They assist in the house breathing, and are also the escape routes for smoke from a fireplace or cooking hood, as well as for hot air from the attic.  The bottoms of pipes and vents are always sealed with a boot, or metal strip, including a lead based or plastic sealant.  These pipes and vents have one way rubber sealed shields so that the air or smoke can escape, but water doesn’t flow into the pipe or vent.

Now onto the roofing tools which include the ladder to climb up to the roof, as well as other items necessary for both installation and removal, as well as for regular maintenance.  These include mundane items such as a broom and bucket to hold waste shingles, a slater’s hammer complete with a hammer as well as an ax and blade, a slate cutter to saw through shingles, seaming pliers to remove shingles, and a hip runner to install the ridge cap, the portion of the roof that caps the seams.

Roofing nails must be long enough to extend through the shingles and go further to about 3/8 inch below the underside of the shingle.  Anything that interferes with the nails biting into the wood might cause the nail to spring out of the shingle, and eventually the loss of shingles.  This includes shingles with ridges, some under shingle materials, and of course nails that aren’t long enough for the roofing material.  A skilled roofer can drive a roofing nail with one solid hit.  A homeowner doing it themselves will find that they can drive the nails with one hit after some practice.

Roofing supplies aren’t as simple as they first seem.  But with a little planning, you’ll have everything needed for a quality roof. If you are doing the job yourself, it does no harm to ask your supplier if he thinks you have forgotten anything. They supply professional roofers all day long and will instinctively know if something is missing from your list of roofing supplies.