Keep Your Roof From Leaking and Surviving Natural Damages

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Anatomy of a modern roof.
Anatomy of a modern roof.
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DRIP! DRIP! DRIP!
DRIP! DRIP! DRIP!
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Nailing 3-tab shingles.
Nailing 3-tab shingles.
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Wrecking bar and slate hook tools.
Wrecking bar and slate hook tools.
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Anatomy of a modern roof 2.
Anatomy of a modern roof 2.
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Use slate nails when working with slate.
Use slate nails when working with slate.
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Make your own hurricane straps.
Make your own hurricane straps.
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For pulling nails and cutting and removing shingles, a roofer's (shingler's) hatchet is a must.
For pulling nails and cutting and removing shingles, a roofer's (shingler's) hatchet is a must.
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Flashing a chimney.
Flashing a chimney.
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Collar tie.
Collar tie.
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For pulling nails and cutting and removing shingles, a roofer's (shingler's) should use a flat-edged shovel or nursery spade.
For pulling nails and cutting and removing shingles, a roofer's (shingler's) should use a flat-edged shovel or nursery spade.

How to keep your roof from leaking and ways for your home to survive damages from nature. 

How to keep your roof on while all around you are losing theirs.

It is the steady, purposeful sound of water falling a full story, ceiling straight to floor: the sound of a leaking roof. Unattended, roof-leak water will saturate your insulation, soak your wallboard, infiltrate headers, studs and flooring, and penetrate your footings to create the moist channels that attract termites and carpenter ants. It will spread into wet spots that encourage wood rot and play host to the molds, fungi and slimes that can gang up to convert your home into a pile of moist sawdust. That is, if it doesn’t short out the wiring in the walls to cause a house fire first.

It is these and similar nightmares that conspire to keep us awake at night the first time we hear a leak from the part of the house that is a total out-of-sight-out-of-mind mystery: the roof.

To compound the worry, let us suppose the leak is the result of the single most common cause of open-roof-area leaks in wooded-country homes . . . something yours truly has encountered four times to date. You awaken after a stormy night of howling, high winds, open the front door and step out into an unexpected wall of wet, leafy green to discover that a great spreading lawn tree — trunk, limbs, twigs, leaves, squirrels, birds nests and all — has fallen onto your roof.

  • Published on Apr 1, 2000
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