Hello, certain Roofing Inspector here.
Many do try and increase the size of, or the pronunciation of the word, it's really just plain old 'roofs'. I must say I do get to hear a number of variations but I think I have a new favourite in roofies.
Also, around these parts we refer to the pitch of a sloped roof as a ratio between rise and run ie: 5:12 and when referring to low sloped roofs it's done as a percentage of rise to run ie: 4%.
Hope that helps. Time for a roofie.
Many do try and increase the size of, or the pronunciation of the word, it's really just plain old 'roofs'. I must say I do get to hear a number of variations but I think I have a new favourite in roofies.
Also, around these parts we refer to the pitch of a sloped roof as a ratio between rise and run ie: 5:12 and when referring to low sloped roofs it's done as a percentage of rise to run ie: 4%.
Hope that helps. Time for a roofie.
Rise and run is pretty standard here too and our house would be something like 5:14 over most of the roof. The bump out is more like a shed roof and a shallower slope. The porch is flat, flat, flat, and is about 240 sqft IIRC.
Nothing leaks which in a 110 yr old house is probably something of a miracle around here, we do try to take care of it.
Nothing leaks which in a 110 yr old house is probably something of a miracle around here, we do try to take care of it.
To add to the confusion, our house is mansard roofed (rooved?). Top section is low slope (probably like Kevin's) but it's small. The rest is probably 6:1 - VERY steep - but we still get ice dams on both the top and mansard portions, though not usually badly. And we haven't yet (knock wood) had a leak. Ours too is over 100 years old but we watch the roof pretty carefully. Ice dams are BIG problems - if you need the snow to insulate the roof, you probably also have ice dams (note I said NEED). thx to google maps, here it is: Google Maps.
The arena in Washington DC has a roof loading rated at 10 pounds per square foot. In Buffalo NY it is rated at 250 pounds per square foot. Both are flat roofs. You have got to see the size of the beams used to make the roof trusses in Buffalo to understand the difference.
Almost on topic the sound system consultants designed very similar sound systems for the Buffalo venue and one in Texas. Not quite understanding the difference they set the sound system equalization the same. As the low frequencies found the Texas roof to be transparent and the Buffalo one almost a perfect reflector a minor adjustment was needed. When the announcer on opening day in Buffalo announced the teams the players could not understand a single word and looked confused as to when they should run out. Cutting the low frequençies by 15 dB on the mixing console kind of fixed that.
My mental arithmetic puts 10 pounds per square foot around 40 kilograms per square meter. So my metric friends can be astounded by the wet snow load in Buffalo.
One advantage for Buffalo is that when shows want to suspend gear from the roof in Washington the plan needs to be reviewed by a structural engineer, not so much in Buffalo.
Almost on topic the sound system consultants designed very similar sound systems for the Buffalo venue and one in Texas. Not quite understanding the difference they set the sound system equalization the same. As the low frequencies found the Texas roof to be transparent and the Buffalo one almost a perfect reflector a minor adjustment was needed. When the announcer on opening day in Buffalo announced the teams the players could not understand a single word and looked confused as to when they should run out. Cutting the low frequençies by 15 dB on the mixing console kind of fixed that.
My mental arithmetic puts 10 pounds per square foot around 40 kilograms per square meter. So my metric friends can be astounded by the wet snow load in Buffalo.
One advantage for Buffalo is that when shows want to suspend gear from the roof in Washington the plan needs to be reviewed by a structural engineer, not so much in Buffalo.
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Well, Mr. Roofer (roover?), look at the photo in the link and tell me it's not more than 24:12. In our area some people use cedar clapboard or cedar shakes. But others use shingles. Ours is shingled but may well have been sided with shakes originally. I get that the shingles don't lie well and bond with the layer below as well as on a more traditional roof. In fact, we lost a few shingles on the mansard in a recent wind storm. But in general it works. And the cost to have it covered with shakes is HIGH!
Ed, there's something off about those numbers.
Carl, hard to tell but that looks like about 30:12 but without seeing it from the side, I can't tell. Also, I didn't say it doesn't happen, I said they stop using shingles above 24:12 as they aren't designed for, nor suited to it. Extra nails are needed to prevent creep and additional adhesive is used as the sticky strip can't work properly without gravity to assist in the bonding as you have noted.
Carl, hard to tell but that looks like about 30:12 but without seeing it from the side, I can't tell. Also, I didn't say it doesn't happen, I said they stop using shingles above 24:12 as they aren't designed for, nor suited to it. Extra nails are needed to prevent creep and additional adhesive is used as the sticky strip can't work properly without gravity to assist in the bonding as you have noted.
Cal,
I had to put in my own trusses to hold up the 800 pound loudspeaker clusters. The roof trusses are really that small. There is extra steel to support specific areas like the scoreboard.
My first hint as to how light the roof was when I went outside during an event. I have never heard so much sound leakage. Outside you could clearly hear the system inside. Only open venues have more bleed.
I had to put in my own trusses to hold up the 800 pound loudspeaker clusters. The roof trusses are really that small. There is extra steel to support specific areas like the scoreboard.
My first hint as to how light the roof was when I went outside during an event. I have never heard so much sound leakage. Outside you could clearly hear the system inside. Only open venues have more bleed.
... So there's noone else that have a few pictures?
The roof of my snow cave is relatively flat though, and can at the very least support a couple of children. Now the snow has set enough I might try and crawl over it (112kg), But I'll try and spread myself out over ca 2 square meters and just flop gently about in the process.
The roof of my snow cave is relatively flat though, and can at the very least support a couple of children. Now the snow has set enough I might try and crawl over it (112kg), But I'll try and spread myself out over ca 2 square meters and just flop gently about in the process.
Cal,
Back when doing a baseball park, I and the audio consultant had walked out via the sunscreen beams to a speaker cluster. The two guys from the electrical contractor stood at the top of the ladder. The rather un-liked assistant projects manager walked straight from the ladder to the cluster over the thin fiberglass panel that provided the shade. All four of us thought the fat guy was going to fall to his death. Surprisingly the panels held his weight. No idea what the load rating was per square foot. I have seen floors rated 25 pounds per square foot.
When they designed the first suspension bridges they worried about full load capacity. They learned you don't have to design them as if they were completely covered by fully loaded trucks. About 30% of that seems to have worked. Trucks today are much heavier.
Yes I was amazed at how little load the roof in a subtropical area was designed to carry.
Back when doing a baseball park, I and the audio consultant had walked out via the sunscreen beams to a speaker cluster. The two guys from the electrical contractor stood at the top of the ladder. The rather un-liked assistant projects manager walked straight from the ladder to the cluster over the thin fiberglass panel that provided the shade. All four of us thought the fat guy was going to fall to his death. Surprisingly the panels held his weight. No idea what the load rating was per square foot. I have seen floors rated 25 pounds per square foot.
When they designed the first suspension bridges they worried about full load capacity. They learned you don't have to design them as if they were completely covered by fully loaded trucks. About 30% of that seems to have worked. Trucks today are much heavier.
Yes I was amazed at how little load the roof in a subtropical area was designed to carry.
16 pounds per square foot? That's not even enough in New Jersey.
Must be some other factor in there giving a huge margin of safety.
The line for 50 lb/sf is south of me. Building codes in this corner of the state are not real specific. I rough-design for 70-100 lb/sf. And I do NOT clear snow from roofs I have built--- that is stupidly dangerous. (I re-roofed the chicken shed and may have cheaped-out at 65 lb/sf; but there are no chickens; also I used plastic panels and in fact the snow slides-off almost the same day it falls.)
I am also guided by the year that Eastport, an hour north of here, got over 120 inches (10 feet, 3m) in one winter, most of that in a few weeks. With drifts it was over porch roofs.
We have few roof snow failures here on "active" buildings. Carpenters here know snow. I hear of snow-failures from points *south*, where snow is small so not defended-against. (Old neglected barns fall in when rot and snow get together; I'm watching two on the bay side road.)
If you do a full Code snow load calc, sometimes the max stress is "tributary". Main roof above a porch roof. Main roof sheds all its snow WHOOMP! onto the porch roof. In NJ where 18" snow is deep, I had to compute my porch for a triangle 48" high at the wall. (Which it would not stand, yet it had stood for 120+ years...)
FWIW: at this moment I have an inch of snow on the main roof. We've had two clumps of about a foot each, with tropic rains between, so the only real snow is plow-banks.
I'm also stunned that you clear chimneys. Here chimneys are built well above the roof. I now have a through-the-wall gas burner, plastic smoke pipe, the manual says 12" above maximum snow, and for $1/foot I just ran the pipes over my head. (Literal 12" would hit my head when mowing...)
simon7000> The arena in Washington DC has a roof loading rated at 10 pounds per square foot. In Buffalo NY it is rated at 250 pounds per square foot. Both are flat roofs.
simon7000> ...amazed at how little load the roof in a subtropical area was designed to carry.
Yes, I can believe Buffalo needs to plan for 250. And if there is no ponding, a no-snow roof only needs to cover its own weight and the rare worker, super-flimsy until you do wind calcs.
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In DC they don't call it wind, it is "Political Discussions."
Roof loading is a big deal in arenas as traveling shows often want to rig rather substantial weights. The best news is LED lighting. What used to weight 100 pounds and draw a kilowatt is now 30 pounds and draws 50 watts. Nicer for adjusting them is if you accidentally brush against some parts you don't burn your skin. LEDs may get hot but nothing like an incandescent lamp.
Lighting rigs that used to require 200 amps three phase are now happy with two 20 amp wall outlets.
Roof loading is a big deal in arenas as traveling shows often want to rig rather substantial weights. The best news is LED lighting. What used to weight 100 pounds and draw a kilowatt is now 30 pounds and draws 50 watts. Nicer for adjusting them is if you accidentally brush against some parts you don't burn your skin. LEDs may get hot but nothing like an incandescent lamp.
Lighting rigs that used to require 200 amps three phase are now happy with two 20 amp wall outlets.
George - there is something less than your one-stage snow blower.
I just got what I call a "3/4-stage" snow toy. It is an attachment for a string trimmer power head.
Ryobi snow-head, $99
Instead of rubber flaps slapping the ground it is a hard plastic rotor with an edge under it. There is no chute- it just throws snow forward. So more like a hard power-broom. The ad suggests it is 15" wide, but the rotor is only 10" wide. The way it works, it must choke-up in >6" of snow, though the booklet suggests "multiple passes".
There is a deeper fallacy. Snow is COLD. Gas trimmer heads are tuned for warmer weather. While I just started a new lawnmower at 15F, it was not easy. Another option is electric trimmer heads.
Ryobi 40V trim head, $169
But the Lithium batteries hate the cold. I got the electric system off the truck at 25F, and the battery charger would not start until the battery had warmed in the house for an hour. The booklet says I can *use* the charged batt down to -4F if I start slow to warm it. However the comments from trimmer users suggest the batt won't do a lot of trimming per charge; also that Ryobi's batteries are crap.
I'm having a hard time seeing how this $168 system beats a $16 shovel. You don't lift the snow, but the system is quite heavy and awkward.
Oh: they were thinking of you. They tell you not to use their product in bare feet.
Mechanically: it is a flex-drive like many string trimmers. The flex bends 90 degrees into the housing. There it spins a 1.5" sprocket, cog-belt with tensioner, 4" sprocket engages rotor. So with a hi-speed head, it may really spin fairly fast, and potentially give good throw, except it can't pack-up the snow dense like a 2-stage should, and the thrown powder will drop.
I'm more impressed by the trimmer head. And if you get fully invested in Ryobi 40V trimmer, edger, pole-saw, and lawnmower, the sno-blo is an obvious frill for places with hardly any snow and too many hooks in the shed.
Snow just now started here and the first 4 inches may be something this toy can push along. But then we expect wet/hard slop.
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I have mowed the lawn in bare feet ever since I was about 12 years old. Weed eater too, but I use a "toy" 120 volt plug in job. It will result in loss of vocabulary control and maybe a small cut if you let it get your feet or bare legs. The heavier gas powered weed eaters cause me too much back pain due to bad disks in my spine. I will run the snow blower in flip flops and a T-shirt if the snow is dry and there is a wind behind me. The wet sloshy stuff results in cold feet even for me.
We got lucky today. School was cancelled by noon yesterday. The TV and everybody else was predicting a snow / ice / frozen rain mess with numbers from 3 to 7 inches.
It rained all night last night and there was a thin layer of ice covering the driveway early but it kept raining well into the day when most of that ice melted. We got a grand total of 1/2 inch of snow when it was gone about 3 this afternoon. The standing water in the yard is however frozen now, and may remain that way for a day or two.
It's headed your way now.