Leaky Garage Roof...Patched?

Okay, I got up on the roof yesterday morning and did my super awesome high end roof patch job....

After talking over options with several pros I came up with this half-assed repair idea. I would use this fancy roofing repair caulk to fill the holes where the shingles had cracked apart and use a piece of flashing metal to make a temporary metal cap shingle.

First off, gotta get up on the roof safely.

I love this ladder...I think some pros might think a ladder like this is 'gimmicky' but it's been super useful for us. We've used it as a straight ladder, a platform when we were grinding all those flooring nails down at Chez 2.0. Here it's being used as a nice roofing ladder (won't F up the gutter).

The Supplies

Yep, can't ya just tell that its going to be a 'high-quality' job? Before I went on the roof I used the clear packing tape on the underside to seal the holes that went all the way through.

Close-up of the fancy roofing Goop I used.

And then I just filled all the cracks with the goop....it cleans up and tools with mineral spirits...I probably should have brought some up on the roof with me to tool the caulk but I didn't...I THINK I forced the caulk down and got it where it needed to go...we'll see....we got a one day reprieve from the rain so I'll have to wait until tomorrow...

Exciting Montage of Cracked Roofing Shingles Filled With Goop.

Now for the super ghetto-fab metal cap shingle.

I ran a BIG bead of caulk around the area before laying the 'shingle' on it. Then I tried to nail through the caulk bead. Just in case I spooged a bit of caulk on to cover the nail heads.

Looks pretty sweet doesn't it?

Of course when I was all done and out of fancy goop I noticed this...

The cap shingles under where I had put my stuff are looking like they are about to go...dang...

Let's hope that it rains tomorrow and I get no leaks....
This roof is totally trashed and really, really needs to be replaced...let's just hope that we can band-aid it along for at least this rainy season....

Leaky Garage Roof...gotta fix it ASAP

Got a day to fix a roof!!!

It's supposed to rain tomorrow.

Having never ever in my life ever really thought about roofing, I've not got a day and a half to stop our garage roof from leaking.

First, I had to determine where exactly it was leaking from. From inside the garage I closed the doors and went looking for sunlight showing through the underside of the roof....well, I found it. There appear to be three main spots where the roof is leaking, though having been up there and seen the condition of the roof I'm surprised it's not leaking in many more places. I stuck yellow pipe cleaners up through the holes so I could see them from above.

One of the main leaks and most light showing is this disintegrated cap shingle.

I don't think that there is a lot of water coming in through here but it has the most light.

From underneath

Doesn't it look all spooky with the real spiderwebs?

I found two other leaks, interestingly enough, where the roof sheathing has a joint.

I believe these leaks are where most of the water is coming in. It gets through the shingles and runs down the underside of the roof where it drips off in various places. See that horizontal crack in all those shingles? That coincides with the roof sheathing joint...coincidence? Those shingles are cracked totally in half and you can see right through into the garage...

Underside view

This, I believe, is the main leaking spot. Look at that fungus damaged sheathing...it's pretty spongy...as in, I don't think it'll take a nail...

Other Side

This leak looks more recent and the sheathing is still pretty solid.

The Plan:

I don't have one. Help...I need to stop this roof from leaking and have the patch hold through this wet season and probably one other...

I've been looking at the roofing isle in Home Despot and hey, you can buy shingles in singles! But you can not buy cap shingles that way...?

I guess my plan is to attach some solid plywood to the underside of the rotted out stuff and then use REALLY long nails to attach the shingles to the roof? How do I do that correctly?

The cap shingle...how do I plug that hole if I can't get a cap shingle to replace the rotted out one?

Any useful advice would be greatly appreciated.

We Need A New Roof!!!

And Now For Something Completely Different.

An entire post about roofs!

We've been talking with roofers recently about getting Chez 3.0 re-roofed....

Here's the situation.

The roof on the garage looks totally shot to us and you can even see where the cap shingles have disintegrated....

We've had two roofers come out so far and look at the house and they both said that the garage roof is completely shot. That the roof was most likely a cheapo 20yr 3 tab shingle that got cooked to death by the lack of venting. I have to admit the garages are SUPER freaking hot even when its not really hot outside.

Here's some shots of the roof of our house from space (don't you just love google!)

The West or front side of the house.

I didn't realize our roof line was so asymmetrical.

Do you see on the front of the house on the second floor between the two sets of bay windows what looks like a flat walkway? It's odd it a little flat roof that is tongue and groove!! Like a floor! Here's a pic.

It doesn't appear to be leaking now but wow, how to insure that it lasts a long time and still looks good?

Also, if you look closer at the little roof over the porch on the left hand side of the picture above you see some more interesting issues.

The north side is quite mossy.

The metal drip-rake edge is put on wrong. Its not supposed to be on top!

Here's you can see the built-up layers of roofing against the fish scale shingles. With no flashing in between. If water runs down that wall where's it going to go???

Here's another shot of the porch roof showing the condition of the shingles.

The East or back side of the house.

Looking out the little window in the gable you can see the shed roof. Which looks like this.

You can also see in the above the weird little flat roof the PO put on the house in the lower left corner. They enclosed an exterior stair well.

Here's a shot of the flat roof from the deck.

Here's a shot through the window.

Both roofers who have seen this say that its a piss-poor job and they are surprised that it doesn't leak.

One issue with fixing this roof is how close it comes to the existing window. Figuring out a way to flash this is going to be difficult I bet.

The North side of the house.

The South side of the house.

An odd thing about the south side of the roof. there is this little ledge that is covered in seriously deteriorated metal. Here's a shot of it through the window.

We've met with two roofers so far and have gotten back proposals from each...

Wow, getting this roof done right is going to cost a pretty penny.

I've got one more roofer scheduled to come by and quote the job but so far the two bids are about 10k apart.

The cheaper bid is from an older established roofer using what I think are old fashioned and slightly substandard materials and methods. The higher bid is from a younger guy and he appears to be using modern materials and methods that are more in line with what my research is telling me a quality roofing job should entail.

I told both roofers that I wanted a quality job that would look nice and be in character for the house/neighborhood and would last at least 40yrs.

Even though its more expensive I got a much better vibe from the younger guy. One thing I liked also about the younger guy was he thought the roofs on the house had a couple of years left in them...the garage shingles are dead he said but the house roof wasn't in super horrible shape.

What might possibly happen if we can't swing the roof is we'll band aid the garage roof through another rainy season and hopefully get the entire place re-roofed next spring.

We'll see what the third guy comes up with.

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