The Roof

11/2/2018

Way behind. Hard to keep up with Bray Construction, but I have also had computer problems and we had a couple of family weddings to attend – all good! So I will try to catch up.

10/25/2018

What is a house, but a roof over your head?

#hardestworkingteaminusa has been busy.

Landus has designed this roof to have ZERO penetrations. The roof, windows, and doors are where you lose most of your energy. A fireplace is a huge hole in your house! Their ambiance and heat in a power outage are the main reasons to have a fireplace. In our previous house, we had a magnificent wood stove with a blower attached and enjoyed it thoroughly. This is another one of those decisions we’ve made in preparation for our retirement. Splitting wood and hauling it in for a fire is great when the power is out, but it is not worth putting a hole through the roof.

We went for the 2-12 mono pitch roof and it will have Galvalume Georgia Rib metal from Georgia Metals right here in Danielsville, GA. We will do much more with this company as we begin to refine our metal siding choices. I shared a diagram of the roof on the page about The House.

You’ve seen the beams and the beginning to this wonderful roof. We had a fortuitous visit from our friend Ed. Ed had hired Landus to build a workshop and it had a layered roof using decking, foam insulation, and tin. Ed shared some issues he had experienced with his roof that we could happily address at this stage of construction. First was the v-groove decking. You can actually see daylight through the v-groove. We have selected to use butyl caulking to remedy this issue. Second, Ed alerted us to carpenter ants and their affinity for foam insulation. Sure enough, after a brief search on the internet, the issue with carpenter ants in foam is popping up. A few of the recommendations involve wrapping the foam with screen to prevent the ants from getting to the foam. We dove in and asked Hansel and team to wrap the edges where we are using the foam. We are thankful Ed shared this with us when he did!

The information we found is that ants do not nest in the foam. They are always looking for wet wood. If they find wet wood, they will nest there. Keeping this house tight but maintaining drying potential for the wood is a key strategy.  We don’t want the wood to get wet, but if it does, we want it to have the ability to dry preventing rot, bugs, and mold.

Here are photos of the screen process on the roof:

 

Another win on the roof! Hansel had prepared us for the need to layer the metal. 42′ long metal would be almost impossible to install. After consulting with Georgia Metal and assessing the situation himself, Hansel decided they could work with the 42′ metal and we managed to use full sheets on the whole roof! Happy days!