Snap lines ??

TRG Minnesota roofer commented about doing 24 squares with a helper in 10 hours. Not a bad days work, but nothing special. If they could average that for a whole year, it would be very good! Unless you are super efficient, you will always do better on Production-per-man-hour working by yourself. With 3-4 or 5 men on a roof, you can certainly get more done, but the production average per man will always go down.

Way back when, my Brother-in-law and myself did a small 12 square house; gable roof 4/12 pitch with 2 short valleys and only 1 story. The shingles were in the back of our pickup trucks, and he backed up to one side and me the other. We got there at exactly noon and the builder was just leaving for lunch. We set up, put on the drip edge and struck the lines and then threw up the shingles. We roofed it, cut the valleys, ridged it and cleaned up and left by 12:59 pm. before the guy got back from lunch! That had to freak him out! That was with 2 guns running and no wasted effort. It can be done, but it is meaningless unless you average it out over a longer period of time.

Old School Said: I used to try and carry a lot. I like my Pettibone forklift better. It will pick upa bunk of OSB and a pallet of shingles and hold them there all day if I like. Makes more sense to me. Thank god for equipment!

24 squares in 10 hours with a helper is 20 man hours--3.6 bundles per man hour. A good steady average. Good work! That is a sustainable pace that wont kill you. Remember the tale of the tortiouse and the Hare, slow and steady wins the race!

Copperman,thanks for the help,and insight,seems the image eventually worked in that post,just not right away for some reason-thanks again

When you go to your album right click on picture and click copy image location. Paste in reply box. Highlight location and click image button on the left under the simile faces. after you click it click on image size and change to 500 or 600 so the picture will come out like the one I posted. Also don't right click on a thumb, do it on the full size image only LOOK MAN I CAN PEE WITH NO HANDS :blink:

Like this

Musta been 4 bundles of starter shingles :P Just Messin with ya -- If i still drank i would like to sit down and have a few beers with you- You sound like most of the guys i roofed with years ago - then arm wrestle:cheer:

I used to try and carry a lot. I like my Pettibone forklift better. It will pick upa bunk of OSB and a pallet of shingles and hold them there all day if I like. Makes more sense to me. Thank god for equipment!

24 squares in 10 hours with a helper is 20 man hours--3.6 bundles per man hour. A good steady average. Good work! That is a sustainable pace that won't kill you. Remember the tale of the tortiouse and the Hare, slow and steady wins the race!

http://www.rooferscoffeeshop.com/show_album_photo.asp?userid=78&albumid=871&file=6485&s=5 how did you get the pics in the post copperman ? image won`t work ??

set up my 40 ft`er solo all the time,have carried 3 17 times in a row (ran out),done 4 up a 40 ft`er fully extended 3 times in a row,known for it around here,I`m known for it around here,Also have carried 5 sheets of 1/2" plywood up a ladder 8 times in a row,I know guys who carried shingles 1/2 a bundle at a time,I am a different type of animal,Very few do what I do as far as carrying weight up ladders,had boys come in all pumped from the gym,and think they would outdo me,didn`t happen,Old posters will know when I went to pittsburgh to help gsp?,I carried 4 so he could verify,and he did-this pic shows me with a 24" wide x 32' long scaffold pick,very few can do reps with it like I can either,here`s a pic

I would like to see the 4 bundles B) In my time i did 3 but i could not get from the ladder to the roof so had to drop them on the eave also could not pick all 3 up had to have the third set on my shoulder.

As far as sqs per day i did 24sq with lines and a helper on a 70 some sq 5/12 wide open couple vents - Dried in, snapped lines, laid them 1 gun 1 helper. and that was 10 hrs with maybe 1 hr break time total.

Our other roofer test was to pick a 40ft ladder over your head and set it up alone.

Not meaning to call you a liar Roofing God but that is the most i have ever heard anyone claim to carry up a ladder and also the most i have ever heard someone could lay in a day and i have met quite a few roofers -- Maybee you are The One And Only Roofing God ;)

member of the 4 bundle club myself ;) We don`t use people to feed us shingles here OS,Tried it out when I helped Shinglemonkey back when,but didn`t like it,seemed the guy was good at jamming shingles into my fingertips,told him to help someone else-lol

and craftsman: there`s even a vid on youtube where a guy carries 4 up the ladder,It`s been posted on here in the past

i snap edge line and bottom course, if it is a straight gable i just run my shingle at the top of the cut out. if there are dormers or another roof meeting it i shingle up to top and then snap a line accross to the end. as far as these crazy figures of sq in a day, i have heard of these guys for 30 yrs but never meet one yet. same with the guy that can carry 2 bundles at a time up the ladder. i work by my self so i set all the shingles the same every time. i can average 2 sq an hour on a straight loaded roof and not kill myself .

Old School; The quality of our roof installations have allways been unsurpassed, which has attributed to our continued success....I can't say we've never had any less than perfect work over the last thirty years, however, never has there been an instance that was of any consequence. We ran an operation of 80+ roofers in the mid-90's.

Snapping horizontal lines on a comp roof is ridiculess, (IMO), unless of course that is is only means in which one can keep straight courses....I'm sure all of you that practice such behaviors have good intentions at heart and truly desire to provide the best product you can. I wouldn't allow it on my projects. I would expect something out of a homeowner/do-it-your-selfer, but certainly not from a seasoned, professional roofer.

Sorry...just plain goofy IMO.

Absolutely correct. I have just heard people asying they can lay 3,4 or 5 squares per hour. I am sure they can too, because I have done that. The bottom line is that if you have someone handing you shingles and the two of you put down 4 squares in an hour, that works out to 2 squares per man hour. If you can average that, at the end of an 8 hour day, you should have on 32 squares and at the end of the week for 40 hours, 160 squares on. That is a true measure when everything is said and done!

"Fire me if you don't like it!" That is funny! Works for me!

squares per day are based on time spent installing shingles only,When I started I did tear offs,and dry ins,Used to have myself with 2 other guys prep the roofs for the "shinglers",Boss used to tell us not to touch the shingling,we used to rip,dry in and load 2 roofs a day on avg(17-20 sq.),Sometimes we would see what they did ,and be disgusted-One day we said the hell with that,and shingled the roof too,"shingler" showed up,and the roof was done,they would say WTF,and we would laugh and say,these people wanted it done right--The boss would be a bit pissy about it,but I told him "I`m not prepping roofs for some hacks to make us look bad", Wasn`t much the boss could say,told him "fire me if you don`t like it!",didn`t happen,I made him too much d*mn $$$

I dont have time to read the whole post so I will just say this and hope it is still relevant Welcome back Sean! I am a west coast roofer and I dont snap lines except when going around a dormer or something similar and then I use G-tape!