by Haris Quintana

The roof plays a yin and yang role for the house. It's both one of the weakest points of the structure but it's also pound for pound probably the strongest. A roof structure is quite fragile at times but if you take care of it, it will withstand high speed winds, sudden torrential downpours and blistering heat waves. It's ability to adapt, contract and expand is amazing which allows us all to sleep safely in our beds at night. And yet, we know so little about it. It's obvious why this is because it's out of sight and thus out of mind. However you will eventually know yourself that the roof is in bad shape when gusts of winds that hit the side of your house seem to filter through and give you a cold chill indoors. You might also begin to get a strange pungent smell in your home too which is down to water leaking into the roof.

Disturbing long cracks

Modern roofs are designed in such a way that they automatically give rainwater channels to seep down without causing build up or damage. However older roofs do not have this inherent design in them. Instead they simply have tiles or basic shingles that are there for wind and drizzle protection. Downpours end up causing water channels in older materials which can be very big trouble is left alone. These channels are not designs they are naturally worn parts of the roof and can eventually form into cracks. If you can see giant cracks that go down multiple layers of your tiling or shingles, you are in danger of the massive leak occuring. This is something you urgently need to address so the under layers do not become sodden and weaker over time.

Sharp thrust impacts

Wind damage is very subtle. When you have properly fitted tiles or shingles the wind will take it's time to loosen them up even more. It won’t happen overnight, it could take many months or years. However the nails and the sticking agents will be eroded away and loosened eventually to the point that you might have sharp thrust impact signs. What are these signs? When a gust of wind hits a loose roof, it can create pockets of damage that look like a small shockwave has blown out from the center. Thus why you should consider contacting a company like D&D Roofing and Sheet Metal that can design and build your home a steep roof. Steep roofs can offer more structural support as well as far better rainwater control. They are inherently tougher than the average slope roof because they have more support beams and sharper angles to drain downpours away.

Roof damage mainly happens because of negligence. What we don’t see we cannot assess. Think about it, how many times have you actually looked up at your roof? It's not something we do and thus we don’t see if we have large cracks in our tiling and whether we can spot wind damage either.