Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself

Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself

Moral: Don’t take off more than you can replace.

Situation

Note: This is not one of our projects. We don’t do residential work.

There was a residential roof replacement project being done by a friend of the homeowner. The scope of work included removing the existing cedar shake roof and replacing it with an asphalt shingle roof. No problem.

The “roofer” had ordered a dumpster to be placed in the driveway. As the existing roof was demolished it could be collected and hauled away at the end of the job.

Mistake

Rather than continuing to pay the daily charge for the dumpster, it was decided to completely remove the existing roof and have it hauled away. No temporary roof was installed.

A quick pop-up thunderstorm overnight dumped an inch and a half of rain in about 30 minutes.

Result

Most of the gypsum board in the house was ruined. Some ceilings dropped. The carpeting was ruined. The electrical system was damaged, etc.

Lesson learned

Although it seems obvious when we are writing re-roofing specifications, we always instruct the roofing contractor to tear off no more of the existing roof than can be “dried-in” or replaced each day. Apparently, this instruction was not obvious to the amateur “roofer”.

No weather forecast is perfect all the time. Make allowances for the worst-case possibility. Take control of the variables you can, because there is often another variable beyond your control.