Started the Roof in the rain

I got the roofing materials delivered Wednesday last week and in the absence of offered help, I decided to go ahead and start tearing off the East end of the roof since the weather 10-day forecast was favorable. Turns out that the forecasters decided to change their minds on Friday when I started, upgrading the forecast to scattered showers; I didn't get the change until after I came inside having just gotten the tar paper up on the roof and my tools cleaned up in time for the real rain to start coming down.

The shingles got delivered to the roof while Sam and I were at a movie, Happy Feet 2, which was actually pretty good. The guy was just finishing up when we got back to the house. I did have to move the 40 sheets of plywood, I got for sheeting the whole front, from the gravel beside the driveway, where it was unloaded, into the garage so it would be secure until I used it.

40 sheets moved one at a time, it took almost an hour. 

Sam helped with sweeping up the saw dust and clearing out the area for the plywood to sit out of the way a little.

While I was actually moving the plywood, Sam was busy painting my Father's Day gift, a frame he had put together at a HD kids project workshop in early June. 

I started out the day with "trimming" the tree in our front yard so I could mount a camera that would allow me to create a time-lapse video of the work I was doing. I got a little carried away, but it was necessary to get a clear view of the whole roof. 

Anyways, I got the old roofing cleared off and the shingles piled on the roof of the garage over the driveway since I forgot to put in the order for the garbage bin until after I started on the roof. The bin got delivered the next day, on Friday, and I got it all moved into the bin easily from the roof.

I digress. So I was anticipating needing to replace most of the sheeting on the roof, but found that most of it was pretty good on that side and I only had to replace one piece that was badly delaminated. It took a lot of effort to get the sheet out without totally tearing it to pieces. I have to admit that the staples they fastened it down with were doing their job well.

I got some of the insulation moved around while the sheeting was off and baffles installed in the rafter spaces where the vent holes are above the top plate. There were some obvious signs of something tunneling in the insulation, but no droppings, so that was at least positive. I have caught 3 mice in the past couple months in the kitchen, so that may be a sign as to where they were hanging out when not in the kitchen.

After trying to level out the insulation, there were some definite gaps in the coverage especially over the outside walls and there was a lack of enough insulation to adequately fill the whole area at the end of the house. There is a sheet of plywood that is put up I guess to help support the roof where the end roof is framed from the rafters that run the other way for the main part of the roof (if you can follow that without a picture.)

I started to get the sheet of plywood back into place and the clips in place between the rafters when it started sprinkling. I didn't think it was going to do much more and was thankful for the cooling effect. I worked to get it in place as quickly as possible and got it nailed in place just as it started to sprinkle harder. My neighbor got home about that time and offered to help with the tar paper before it really started raining. He and his son, who are evidently roofers, came up and basically took over putting up the tar paper and tucking pieces of it up in the vulnerable places around the gable, that I may not have thought of, so quick I found myself just standing there not knowing how to help them without being in the way.

It just started rainig when I was cleaning up the tools and getting down off the roof. It was a good start, but way slower than I thought it would be going.