Day 90 - Shingles!

Shingles are a very good thing

 The first section of shingles was laid today.  I was beginning to worry that this day may never actually arrive, but Emily has the pictures to prove i!t  We went with Timberline HD 30 year shingles in Pewter Grey.    Your can't get a good idea of the color from our pics, but you can see a close-up of the color below.

Bring on the rain/sleet/snow!

Timberline HD - Pewter Grey

Building a House with "2 Roofs"

 It has taken longer to get the shingles put on because of how we are constructing the roof.  With SIPs the panel itself provides the strength for the roof.  If the OSB panel gets wet & can't dry out, the OSB will rot causing catastrophic damage to the roof panel.  This is most likely to happen when the shingles are applied directly to the SIP roof panel.  There was a major issue with this in some SIP homes built in Juno, Alaska.  The SIP roof panels were not sealed properly on the interior, moisture migrated between the panels and the OSB got really wet.  Unfortunately, because the shingles were applied directly to the SIP roof, there was no way for the panels to dry, they ended up looking like this:

Ouch!  Not going to happen to our house if I can help it!

 The solution is to create a space between the SIP roof panel & the shingles so that air can flow over the SIP to dry it out in the event it should get wet.  This is why Emily & Harry have been telling people that our house is going to have "2 roofs".  Basically we are nailing 1x3" furring strips the the SIP roof and laying a 2nd layer of OSB decking over the top of the furring strips.  The felt paper & shingles get nailed onto this 2nd layer of OSB creating a nice channel for air to flow from the eaves to the ridge vent.

Something like this

Additional cost to add a 2nd roof onto your SIP house?  ~$5,000
Peace of mind knowing that your SIP roof won't rot away in 10 years?  PRICELESS!!!

(I'm beginning to realize why Emily keeps asking me why we are putting so much money into areas of the house that no one will ever see!)

Retaining walls

In other news, TreeTop Nursery will be putting in a couple of retaining walls for us in the near future.  We wanted to get them put in yet this fall to help prevent erosion next spring when the snow melts.  We debated several different types of block for the walls, but we couldn't decide on a color we liked.  In the end, we decided to go with boulder walls.  A little more maintenance in the long run, but I think we'll really like the natural look.  Pics to follow once they start actually building the walls!