Snap lines ??

I watched the unforgiven tonight with clint where he says - I havew killed just about everything that has ever walked or crawled in my time --

I can honestly say i have laid shingles on almost every surface known to man -- I have put them on roofs -- sidewalks -- driveways - trails in the woods - in the pond - even nailed them to trees -- bottom of my boat -- used theem as shims under cabnits windows doors god i could go on and on -- :woohoo:

:blink:

What is "good enough" is a retorical question for everyone to answer for themselves. It is similiar to asking "how much is enough" when you are talking about money. We ALL tend to want to stretch the limits and test the waters, but where do we stop?

All the lines in the world won't keep a roof straight if they are a. Measured incorrectly or b. not followed! All of the gauges in the world won't keep a roof straight if they are not used. If you can install a roof "good enough" without lines, and you can be proud of it when you walk away, then I say go for it.

I will say that whatever we do in the small things, we will also do in the larger things. I try and disipline myself to always do things for others in exactly the same way I would do them for myself. I believe it is called the "Golden Rule" Nothing new there eh! It really doesn't take any longer to do things the right and correct way, and I am certainly not just talking about roofing here. Wouldn't it be a great world if everyone did their best?

I look at some of the pictures that Mike from NZ posts and I am constantly impressed with his attention to detail. He works by himself and if there is a mistake, he knows exactly who to blame. Mike Hicks has posted some of the pictures of his jobs and he has a large crew. Those pictures show great attention to detail. Twil shows the same disipline with his pictues of copper work and slate. We work with slate and tile and try to do a nice and neat job with that. I could go on and on, but you get the picture.

There is a Japanese term for it and I believe it is Kansai, but it means "Continual Imporvement" You are always striving to improve in everything. Most are small things, but they all add up to the whole. Think of this when you are working and figure out what "good enough" means to you

Like Lanny; Never heard of such a thing prior to this board! Bizzarro! Been installing comp since 1980...Lot's & lot's of it!

Tom, do you mean striking lines and following them or even the question of what is "good enough?"

The reason I ask is because I am old enough to remember the "Big Three" when they controled most of the car market in the States. They made junk and by "they" I mean the UAW and the Management. They were too big to be bothered, and "where else would the customers go?" It was all junk, but it was "good enough" It took a while, but they all got their asses handed to them on a platter.

OUR customers, and by that I mean all of our customers on this forum, are not stupid. Given the choice, they will take quality over "good enough" and they are and they will. I am not criticizing anyone for how they do their jobs, but I want everyone to think of why they do what they do and if it can be improved. In the short and the long run, it will benifit us all!

I see this place all the time and every time it reminds me of what happens when you have a roofer that can't use a tape or chalkline. It might even contribute to why this house has sat unsold for 2 years.

On a side like that, I would measure down from the top and strike lines every 4 courses. If you are off by a 1/4 of an inch when you start at the bottom of the valley, you end up with the mess he has just above the two stack pipes. At least he tried to straighten it our at that point. I have seen roofs where they do the same thing and end up having 3 and 4 more rows of shingles at the valley because they were running downhill so badly. It is not that hard to do it right.

Lines for me. Wish I could just slap some pix up because I have some doozies! :laugh:

Id probably snap 2-3 lines around that dormer -- Pretty long valley to back shingle -- Quicker to snap a couple

This reminds me of the hand nail 40 sq in a day posts.For every hand nailer I have met that boasted about there amazing exploits,but were unable to replicate them in real life on our jobs,we found the same storys about being able to roof with no lines and it coming out perfectly strait.

The hand nailing speed was made because these guys usually failed to that "the felt had been laid,roof loaded,and had a feeder.I am concerned abou about how fast and welll the complete square is done within our production # not how fast you canslap a shingle down and miss align the nails.

With lines I have found 2 things.#1When not snapping I pooint out how far off the lines are they cant see it.You have 2 people looking at it differently.#2"Thats OK because I straiten out the top 3 rows so you dont see it along the ridge."I have also found that these guys dont properly locate nails,cut clean rake edges,run straight ridge,ect..And I can tell you that they are honest in believing what they are doing is as good or better than the way we install,and faster.They are gone quick.

I am not saying this is anyone on this board,just that the dozens of guys I have heard these storys from have not been able to truly asses the job quality because they have nothing else to compare it to intraining or there market because this may be the standard in there area.

Serrano Said: This reminds me of the hand nail 40 sq in a day posts.For every hand nailer I have met that boasted about there amazing exploits,but were unable to replicate them in real life on our jobs,we found the same storys about being able to roof with no lines and it coming out perfectly strait.

The hand nailing speed was made because these guys usually failed to that the felt had been laid,roof loaded,and had a feeder.I am concerned abou about how fast and welll the complete square is done within our production # not how fast you canslap a shingle down and miss align the nails.

With lines I have found 2 things.#1When not snapping I pooint out how far off the lines are they cant see it.You have 2 people looking at it differently.#2Thats OK because I straiten out the top 3 rows so you dont see it along the ridge.I have also found that these guys dont properly locate nails,cut clean rake edges,run straight ridge,ect..And I can tell you that they are honest in believing what they are doing is as good or better than the way we install,and faster.They are gone quick.

I am not saying this is anyone on this board,just that the dozens of guys I have heard these storys from have not been able to truly asses the job quality because they have nothing else to compare it to intraining or there market because this may be the standard in there area.

Have to agree there,have done 24 sq a day handnailing,and as much as 35 sq a day with the gun with a squeaky clean finished product--Have had plenty claim more squares but find the workmanship to be crap,and that they cut mega corners on the details--I always trained the guys to learn how to do it right 1st,then work on the speed,everything especially the angle you hold the gun at when nailing,makes a difference,many roofs the "roofer" has popped nails all over which cut thru the shingles later because they couldn`t hold the gun right

TRG you are not only a roofer, but you are a "God" But right on all accounts! I think it is funny to read some of the exploits of the "roofers" posted here and other places. Like you say, when you finally get down to the where the rubber meets the road, the facts don't often line up with the claims. No matter how fast a person may be, the best way to determine it would be to let them work for a month or 5 and then divide the number of squares installed by the number of hours they worked. that would be a real measure of production. When I was younger and we hand nailed everything, we used to try and get at least 1 square per hour per man at the end of the day. 5 men, 8 hours, 40 squares. Now we could certainly do more than that, but I am talking about travel time, set up, felting drip edge, cleanup, everything. If you average 4 bundles per man hour, you are up to 53 squares. ALL moves count when talking about production.

I dont have time to read the whole post so I will just say this and hope it is still relevant Welcome back Sean! I am a west coast roofer and I dont snap lines except when going around a dormer or something similar and then I use G-tape!

squares per day are based on time spent installing shingles only,When I started I did tear offs,and dry ins,Used to have myself with 2 other guys prep the roofs for the "shinglers",Boss used to tell us not to touch the shingling,we used to rip,dry in and load 2 roofs a day on avg(17-20 sq.),Sometimes we would see what they did ,and be disgusted-One day we said the hell with that,and shingled the roof too,"shingler" showed up,and the roof was done,they would say WTF,and we would laugh and say,these people wanted it done right--The boss would be a bit pissy about it,but I told him "I`m not prepping roofs for some hacks to make us look bad", Wasn`t much the boss could say,told him "fire me if you don`t like it!",didn`t happen,I made him too much d*mn $$$

Absolutely correct. I have just heard people asying they can lay 3,4 or 5 squares per hour. I am sure they can too, because I have done that. The bottom line is that if you have someone handing you shingles and the two of you put down 4 squares in an hour, that works out to 2 squares per man hour. If you can average that, at the end of an 8 hour day, you should have on 32 squares and at the end of the week for 40 hours, 160 squares on. That is a true measure when everything is said and done!

"Fire me if you don't like it!" That is funny! Works for me!