Interesting Roofing Tales

Strange but true. ( Well, not too strange to me, anyway. It's how I operate.)

As I finished a job this week and received my check, the LOH asked me to teach her kids how to repair slate so she could send them up there. :laugh:

From my 'Rent-a-Roofer' site, I'll teach peopel how to do roof repairs, for a fee. After I had demonstrated how to punch slate, cut slate, and repair slate, the Ho paid and said he was going straight to R&S and buy the necessary equipment and then he'd send Sarah up as soon as she got home from school! :woohoo: He'd coach as his 14 y.o. daughter did repairs to their 8/12 slate roof.

Another time, I arrived of site to install scads of snowguards on a 2 story 10/12. The LOH came out and asked if it climbing all over the slate roof was anything like rock climbing. I said it was. "Can you show my son what to do?" "Why?" "Because he's supposed to be doing chores here to help out when he's home! And he's xxxxxx, a world class rock climber! And don't worry about the money! We'll sit here in the yard and drink tea until he's finished and I'll pay you then." I outfitted him, showed him how to hook in snowguards, replace a slate, then the LOH and I relaxed for a couple of hours with only a few breaks so I could take him a replacement slate now and then.

I didn't see the littel buggers climb up, but wife showed up and took pix as they were leaving!

It turned out the LOH's kids had finally hit her last straw. She told them to go outside. They said the it was hot, and she said, "Well help the roofer." Ages 5-9. The little girl on the ladder with the black hair is the leader of this pack.

I was drying the roof of a mansion with an 8/12 roof. The homeowner couple and 12 year-old son appeared at a window at the top floor. The kid asked his Dad if he could climb out on the roof. In spite of it being a three storey drop, the Dad encourages him.

When I lay felt on steeper pitches, I like to get the battens on as soon as possible, so the roof below the window had battens and traction wasn't a problem. But as soon as the kid starts to feel confident, the Dad challenges him, "scale the peak, son." The kid takes off to the highest point of the house above where there's felt and on to bare plywood. Both parents cheer. Then the kid discovers traction on steep, bare plywood is alot different going uphill than downhill and he freezes in panic. He had to be rescued by two roofers with ropes and harnesses.

i'm still shaking my head...

Now those are funny, to me anyway. People with slate roofs are passionate about them, but normally it is them that want to get up there and learn and not their kids. I had a homeowner that worked with me on a round eyebrow slate roof once. He had already bought all of the tools for slate and wanted to see how they worked; course we were using my tools and scaffold on that roof, but he wanted to see it anyway.

I wish that some of the "roofers" out there would take the time to learn the proper techniques to repair slate instead of just cementing them on and face nailing. Hey, just influencing people and making friends here, and if the shoe fits, wear it!