Be careful what you ask for! Remember i have a hoarding "problem" Used some of the milled cedar to make a door for a screen porch.
A shop I built for myself in the PNW a few years back. I sawed all the lumber out of very large sitka spruce (largest was 8 feet diameter at about 8' above the ground), I decided to make the shingles as well, since I had an over abundance of the wood to work with. We just sawed 3/8" thick clear vertical grain boards, and then cut them to 16" length if I remeber correctly. They were not tapered because that's not as easy as not tapering them and they worked fine for siding, dunno how it would have worked on a roof.
They do make straight split WRC shakes for siding and roofing. Never have worked with them though BEAUTIFUL structure btw Id go back just to admire it!
I hope you've gotten to tear off the old farm houses with wood shakes on the bottom and 3 layers of asphalt shingles on top of them! Fun times!
Yup. Ive done a few with four layers. Most had three. Man is that old cedar dusty. Id only do them in the colder weather with long sleeves on. I do very little large scale roofing anymore. Most houses with multiple layers like that have been torn off and redone. As strange as it sounds i used to enjoy tearing into those old roofs. Kinda like a history time table.
Thanks! It was a very enjoyable project... True about the split shakes not being tapered, it would be nigh into impossible to hand split consistently tapered shakes.
That reminds me of when I was a kid helping my dad on remodeling jobs, we were always finding interesting things in the guts of old houses! We did one roof that had lots layers of different era roofing material... split shakes, two layers of cedar shingles, fish-scale, then I think two layers of three-tab. You're right about the dust from cedar shingles.... mix in some of mouse, and bat, and bird poop, and a bunch of moss n mold, and it's really nasty stuff!
Sure is nasty stuff. 30+ years ago i developed a cough in the middle of the Summer. Very chronic. Finally went to the doctor and it was bronchitis. Took forever to get rid if it and have had what i call my "roofers cough" ever since. Not bad in recent years as i dont do much roofing. Every Fall id catch a cold with the temp change and it would turn into bronchitis. Dont smoke either, just too much dust exposure would cause it to kick in. Ive done a couple wood shingle only tear offs in recent years. Those arent too bad, just banana peel slippery when wet!
Yep. I have the same type of thing. I got a really bad infection from tearing old carpet out of a truck that was sitting with mice in it for 12 years. Now I am very sensitive to mouse crap. Same with mold. Several heavy exposures and viola, high sensitivity.
Leave it to a machinist to mount a digital readout to his sawmill I may or may not have taken out my dial calipers once or twice when I was building my deck
I used my transit to set the blocks for the deck last year. I probably drove my helpers nuts with "add a few more stones" or "take out a few stones" to get the elevation just right (+/- a 1/16"). It's funny how I measure things in thousandths, but also love rustic wood and hand split shakes.
Yep, shirt off, sweating like an SOB and all that $hit just sticks to ya! Made for an interesting color going down the drain in the shower after work... I can't believe some of the weight that was on some of those old houses roofs!
