Will they ever learn?

We finished a job today where we tore out the old soffit on a house, and vented the whole house. they have had others in in the last few years adding insulation and gable end vents and anything else they could think of but NEVER thinking to get the bathroom vents vented outside or opening up the soffits. We took out 2 55 gallon trash bags of celulose insulation out of the soffits when we cut them open. black mosd on the underside of the plywood and the owner complained of "smelling" the insulation upstairs last week at night when it was hot out.

There are no shortcuts to venting a house properly, and it is expensive to do it right. We are batting 1000% on these jobs now, about 50 for 50. I wonder when the rest of the world will catch up?

Twill not everyone is right here.

OK I let it go. PC

No really Patty. I saw it here on the RCS.............. :laugh:

I found, throughout my career, that ventalation issues and their problems arise out of many different circumstances. Two houses next to each other may be the same in design and materials....but two different factors causing problems.

It can get the best of us and cause a real headache at times. You are so focused and expect to find condensation issues and that is all you look for when in fact after... several hrs of inspection, it was truely a leak point from the outside causing the problem.

Twill you are better than that.

Ventilation is different around the country. You have to know your area.

What's right here in PA is not right in other states.

I know HO think they know, some do, not always.

I have learned to give the work to people that know. I've tried it on my own, I suck. PC

Carpenters & Builders are always right Robby. As are the bricklayers, plumbers and laborers. It is the Roofers that don't know anything......we need to just shut up and only speak to quote price.

The only 3 words are you need to say: Shingles, Squares And Dineros If you can master those 3 words, you are a qualified roofer

Ventalation is very inportant....

The co. I worked for roofed a house 5 yrs prior...all plywood on the front of the house was replaced. The homeowner had a front addition built about 5 yrs before the re-roof. (gable roof extending out)

Called out to inspect condensation in the garage....the garage was an extension of their problems as the interior plywood on the house was black.

The result of the inspection....they built the addition with soffit vents, but on top of the existing roof.(new addition vented but not he main house). This closed off all the soffit vents on the main house, thus causing mold build-up and plywood deterioration...when I explained this to the customer, He was baffled and did not believe a word I said. "The addition was built correctly", he said to me.

Good analogy Tin Man. CTS I'll bet that the nail was driven by an air gun and they had held the gun at an angle and shot that sucker in so that it cut the shingle.

Jim, we did thousands of roofs without felt for years. No reason to put it down unless you were trying to waterproof it for a bit before you installed the shingles. It would also buckle and cause the shingles to ripple if you didn't cut out the wrinkles. Times have sure changed.

Years ago everyone thought that by adding insulation from the cieling to the bottom of the substraight, this was good. We all know now, if your bothering to pay attention, that insulation is depleated by ten times with just a little mositer. Still air is wet air, moving air is dry air. Ice cubes in a glass sweat. The same glass with a fan blowing on it has no sweating. So simple, everyone but some contractors don't understand.

I like the roofs that have gable vents, gravity vents, PE, ridge vent, and soffit vents all on the same roof.

- I just shake my head cause most of the time it is the homeowner that thinks he/she 'knows all' and that 'more' is better.

Had a leak call once and all the protrusions were a disaster and anyone of them could be the cause. I fixed them properly. Got a return phone call and it was still leaking! What the heck! Crawled up in the attic on the next rain and saw water dripping from a nail between sheating boards. With a buddy up on the roof, I pushed on the nail a little and he saw which shingle tab it was. It had torn the shingle just enough (half the diameter of the nail head!) to let water pass on through. No way could I have seen this SMALL tear otherwise.

OS, I remember the days (SE Michigan) when the houses were roofed without felt. I never really thought it did anything until I moved to TX.

The first job I did here was a small roof repair. They had a leak about 8' up from the wall in the middle of their great room. I figured I'd go outside and see a vent or pipe or sidewall or something. The roof was clean for 20 feet in any direction and nothing above it. Stumped, I told them that the only thing I could do was open the roof up and look. When I opened it up, I found one corner of the felt folded up backwards exposing a small section of the sheathing. I felted that area properly, and reshingled. Two years later I spoke with the people and they haven't had a problem since.

How/why would you explain that we didn't need any felt back in MI but need it now in TX? My only guess is that when it rains here, it often rains sideways and it blew enough water up under the sealed shingles that enough trickled down from above to damage the drywall ceiling.

I'm now sold on felt even though it has 10,000 holes in it.

Most of the people out there don't know what they don't know. IF they would only read and follow the directions on the wrappers, they would do a lot better ,but I would be that not one wrapper out of 100,000 is ever even looked at let alone "read" bummer!

I'll say this we had a standard, I&W along the eaves and also the valleys. This was a standard for residential. Commercial is another story , now your'e dealing with Generals. By contract. I would read it and looked at prints, talked to the bossman, made recommendations , we would approuch for changes. Sometimes yes sometimes no. Some times you get lucky. We all love getting lucky. hahahaha PC

I love the education I got through this. The understanding of it all is wonderful. PC

The commercial jobs were a chore, most were rubber, choice, gutter size, damn , MY BOYS were working it, not me. Yes they were MY BOYS, I would meet the vans everyday the pulled in. PC

And every one of these guys were prolly licensed by the state of MI to wreak havoc.....

I hear ya OS. We've tightened up the last few years and DEAL WITH IT. However, 80% of the people selling roofs don't know what they are selling or installing.

Lifetime shingles? Only on the 20% or so of the shingle roofs that are installed correctly. The rest'll be out of luck

The "answer" for the last 20 years has always been "ice and water" (fire and ice) if remember some of the guys calling it, Ridge vent (all kinds) and then 24 " of insulation blown in that covers everything. This is followed by ice build-up, mold, curled shingles, moss on the roofs, granules falling off and then tearing it all off and redoing the same thing again.

When the houses were not vented and the insulatin was negligable, the houses were drafty and they vented themselves. Now that they are tighter, it is more important than ever for them to be fully vented. A well insulated fully vented house doesn't need grace or felt for that matter. Just nail on the shingles over the bare wood and it will be fine. We did that for years on thousands of houses and never had one problem. It was VERY common in the 50's and 60's.

Hey, you wonder why they call me "Old School"? I was roofing before most of you guys were born! Been there and done all that!

Good for you OS. I learned so much by estimating. I was not a worker but an estimator. I had to know this stuff. I'm working on commercial buildings, had to know about ventalation, drainage etc. I think I pissed a few people off because I know too much. I'm laughing hahaha PC

I loved my job, we grew together, I started answering the phone, it graduated to being an estimator. Go figure. hahaha PC