As we have mentioned in past categories we have not been happy with our roof. It was a wavy and bumpy mess. The stucco flex that we applied to the roof works fine on the smooth areas but does not do well on the augments where the foam was messed up. It is a good product. It just could not take care of our problems forever. I am not saying anything bad against the product. It is not made to cover large cracks like we did. Most of the roof augment problems were from a storm that we had during inflation. It went down hill from there, but we were able to get through it and have had time to think of a solution. We have had suggestions for a solution from people and we thank you for them. We had many areas which needed to be smoothed out and decided that metal cladding would probably be the best for covering those areas on the roof. Time will tell. Hopefully we wil not be sorry and have to do the roof again.
Our first step was to add some mortar mixed with foam beads to the big dips. We then are covering those areas with metal roofing sheets to give a good walk on surface. We also thought it would be easier to apply the metal cladding to a surface that was more solid.
After we did that we added metal flashing around the whole dome and extra flashing under the windows where the corners are. We have had a few corners leak where the wood framing meets the cement so we are hoping that this will put a stop to that. All of this will be covered with the metal cladding. We attatched the flashing with tar roof adhesive and flat metal screws.
We found a local place to purchase 24 gauge metal coil from. We had them cut it into 14 inch square pieces. Each piece has a protective film on it so that the paint does not get sctatched during bending and cutting. With an inch overlap on each tile it will be a 12 inch piece showing. We were able to buy what we hope is enough metal cladding but they have plenty more if we need to have more cut. They are about 15 minutes from our front door so that is very nice if we need more. We are using 3/4 inch stitch screws with washers to attatch them together. On the back of each piece we are applying Liquid Nails adhesive to help hold it in place while we are joining each piece together.
We are installing the squares on a diagonal. We thought that it would look good and give visual interest. Our son has informed us that it looks like dragon scales. Will we have to rename the dome?
We have worked on the dome for two and half days and have installed about 420 pieces so far. We will continue to work on the roof when Jim is off of work and the weather permits. Please pray for good weather in North Texas over the Christmas Holiday because Jim is off for over a week. We did have great weather over Thanksgiving so we were able to start and do as much as we have. The whole roof should be done by spring with good weather.
We worked on the metal cladding over the Christmas Holiday when we could. We had 2 snow storms which is very unlike Texas.( See what happens when we start a project!) The last white Christmas was in the 1920's.
We started on the top of the dome and found that the tiles straightened themselves out over the top of the augments. We tried to get back to the diagonal pattern but with the slope it was not working. We did a few rows and were not happy with the results. There was alot of waste and crazy seams that did not look diagonal so we switched back to the straight pattern that happens over the augments. Luckily we had only done some of the roof between three augments.
When we got closer to the top we started to add a layer of roofing tar paper under the tiles for added protection. David South recommended it when we talked to him about Metal Cladding.
When we climbed down from the roof Sunday evening half frozen we had installed 1000 tiles over the Holiday break. We have an 18 foot diameter circle left to do on top of the roof and then some spots on the sides of the augments. After that we will fill in around the brick ledge where there are points with half tiles and then finally cover the fronts of the augments. Looks like I will be going back to get metal a third time. Hopefully another 400- 500 tiles should cover it.
While we had bad weather Jim worked on my pantry and baseboards. Check out the new pictures in Stairway section and the Pantry section.
