I am one of the Trustees at our Church. We try to be conservative with our spending, but, are responsible for a campus of buildings built over a 150 year period. We have an old parsonage turned into an office building with a Mansard roof that was seriously deteriorated. This is essentially a third story roof with a near vertical face. We decided to let the pros handle it, and it was a good thing. Under the obvious worn, curled, and cracked asphalt shingles was a complete slate shingle roof.
However long ago it was last repaired, they nailed asphalt over slate. I guess those church men carried big hammers.
Near this building is a much smaller, lower to the ground garage with a similarly worn roof.
We asked our contractor to add enough shingles to his order for us to tackle this small building ourselves. I organized and scheduled the volunteers on this project. Fortunately, one of our congregation owns a small dump truck, we backed it in along side the garage and started stripping at 8:00 a.m.
To make it easier, and safer for the team of mostly retired gentlemen, we set up some scaffolding to get started.
With enough help, we were able to keep two man teams running each of two air nailers, and still have a pair of guys on the ground delivering nails, shingles, cutting our ends, and generally keeping the ground as clean as possible.
A couple of the guys were less comfortable actually working on the roof, but no problem, we were easily able to keep the air guns popping. By afternoon we were well on our way on the other side. (I'm the guy in the red shirt)
The Bostitch nailer, nails, and compressor operated flawlessly, and probably nailed down 75-80% of the shingles. The second compressor was paired to a Chinese knock-off, and did not fair nearly as well. The owner/operator spent a lot of time oiling, adjusting, fiddling with pressure, pulling and replacing miss-nails. A word to the already wise, buy good tools, you'll be rewarded every time you use them.
We finished up our roof around 4:00 p.m. save the cap. It was kind of cool, and we didn't want to roll our cold cap shingles over the peak. So, we surprised the Church secretary, and put a bundle of cap shingles in her office for over night to warm up. Two of us went back the next morning and finished up the cap, policed our work site, and hauled our trash to the dump before noon.
All in all, we saved probably $1000 dollars, enjoyed a great day of work and fellowship, and probably to a man, stretched some muscles that will be well served to rest a couple days before the next project.
However long ago it was last repaired, they nailed asphalt over slate. I guess those church men carried big hammers.
Near this building is a much smaller, lower to the ground garage with a similarly worn roof.
We asked our contractor to add enough shingles to his order for us to tackle this small building ourselves. I organized and scheduled the volunteers on this project. Fortunately, one of our congregation owns a small dump truck, we backed it in along side the garage and started stripping at 8:00 a.m.
To make it easier, and safer for the team of mostly retired gentlemen, we set up some scaffolding to get started.
With enough help, we were able to keep two man teams running each of two air nailers, and still have a pair of guys on the ground delivering nails, shingles, cutting our ends, and generally keeping the ground as clean as possible.
A couple of the guys were less comfortable actually working on the roof, but no problem, we were easily able to keep the air guns popping. By afternoon we were well on our way on the other side. (I'm the guy in the red shirt)
The Bostitch nailer, nails, and compressor operated flawlessly, and probably nailed down 75-80% of the shingles. The second compressor was paired to a Chinese knock-off, and did not fair nearly as well. The owner/operator spent a lot of time oiling, adjusting, fiddling with pressure, pulling and replacing miss-nails. A word to the already wise, buy good tools, you'll be rewarded every time you use them.
We finished up our roof around 4:00 p.m. save the cap. It was kind of cool, and we didn't want to roll our cold cap shingles over the peak. So, we surprised the Church secretary, and put a bundle of cap shingles in her office for over night to warm up. Two of us went back the next morning and finished up the cap, policed our work site, and hauled our trash to the dump before noon.
All in all, we saved probably $1000 dollars, enjoyed a great day of work and fellowship, and probably to a man, stretched some muscles that will be well served to rest a couple days before the next project.