Protecting attic insulation from re-roofing debris

[Stephen Tashiro]

Is there an inexpensive way to keep debris that falls during re-roofing from covering reflective insulation in attics?

I'm particularly interested in the situation where the roof underlayment is 1958 vintange 1x8 boards. They are set close together with only a small gap between their edges. Is there a thin sheet of some material that can be glued to the bottom of the roof deck to keep out gravel from shingles when the roof is replaced? (As yet, there is no reflective insulation in the attic, I'm debating whether to install some.)

Some articles online insist that reputable roofers will clean up debris that falls into attics. However, in the house I'm thinking about, this is an unreasonable expectation. At its highest point, the attic space isn't tall enough for a person to stand upright. The only practical way to work on things at the edges of the attic is to cut holes in the ceiling. I don't mind cutting holes in the ceiling during remodeling to put something over the bottom of the roof deck, but I wouldn't want to cut holes in the ceiling every time the house is re-roofed in the future just to do clean-up.

[Brian Elfert]

In Minnesota I've never heard of a roofer cleaning up inside an attic. Loose fill insulation is very popular here and it would be next to impossible to get roof granules out of loose fill insulation.

One thing to try is to put those plastic venting chutes between the rafters all the way to the top. You might need to leave a decent gap down at the bottom so the roof actually vents. You also couldn't cover any roof vents. The bottom chute you would want to close up the end to keep the debris from coming out.

[Bruce Wrenn]

With shingles now carrying a "Lifetime Warranty," how many more times do you plan on re-roofing?

[Bill Dufour]

I bet in fifty years, when you need to redo the shingles, there will be a requirement to plywood the roof to make it into a shear panel for wind and seismic loading when the reroof becomes too thick for the codes.
Bil lD

[Ed Aumiller]

instead of shingles, put up a metal roof... good for 100 plus years...

[Stephen Tashiro]

I bet in fifty years, when you need to redo the shingles, there will be a requirement to plywood the roof to make it into a shear panel for wind and seismic loading when the reroof becomes too thick for the codes.
Bil lD

The 1958 house has only one layer of shingles. Its current roof is in good condition. Locally, it is unusual to replace a shingled roof without removing the old paper and shingles.

Perhaps stapling tar paper to the underside of the deck is a simple solution. It would be penetrated by some nails when the house is re-roofed, but it should keep out a lot of debris.

[Stephen Tashiro]

One thing to try is to put those plastic venting chutes between the rafters all the way to the top. You might need to leave a decent gap down at the bottom so the roof actually vents

That's an interesting idea. For what they are, the plastic venting chutes stocked in local hardware stores are expensive, but Amazon has better deals on them.

[Tom Bender]

Stephen
I agree with your concern. In my attic there is no practical access. The blown in insulation buries the trusses. One suggestion, install some foil backed insulation with the foil up. But this might cause a condensation problem.

Bruce and Bill
You may get a lifetime from your shingles but mine are only mortal and will need replacement in another 15 years.

Brian
Yes that could work but I'd want to clean out the soffits.

[Brian Elfert]

That's an interesting idea. For what they are, the plastic venting chutes stocked in local hardware stores are expensive, but Amazon has better deals on them.

The chutes are $1.50 each in packs of ten at Home Depot if your rafters are 24" on center. They are about $2 each for the 16" on center ones. They are four feet long.

[Curt Harms]

We have a storage space/attic under the roof. I wasn't fond of walking around with hundreds of roofing nails sticking through the plywood so stapled 1/8" hard board to the underside of the rafters though not continuous so no venting concerns.

[Mark Bolton]

instead of shingles, put up a metal roof... good for 100 plus years...

This is a total myth. Even the higher quality metal roofing materials out there today have the same cosmetic lifespan as an asphalt roof. The "100 year" roofs of old will not fly for most people nowadays in that in a few years you will have to go up and re-coat the roof with a gloppy, rolled on, roof coating that will not be esthetically pleasing to any of todays consumers. If you go the more expensive route of one of the modern concealed fastener pseudo standing seam roofs you will avoid fastener issues, and if you go for a true standing seam you better have your checkbook handy and the comparison to asphalt will likely never be a consideration (if you can afford true standing seam you will not even be considering asphalt in the first place).

All of the roll formed painted products on the market today will chaulk/fade/rust in short order and likely in the 30 year range will be clearly showing their age if not failing. I recently had a 40 year classic rib painted roof (typical green) fail on a customers home (paint was just rolling off in large flakes) that the manufacturer replaced under warranty shipping out the panels only, no labor. Thats their warranty. Even the non-peeling portions of the roof were chaulked and faded after 10-15 years.

After that you get into the fastener issues with exposed fastener roof's in that the elastomeric washer/seals will fail over time from UV, and the constant grinding of expansion and contraction. Then water starts to weep in around the screws and your ability to run a new screw in the same hole is ZERO.

Then you get to the fact that most metal roofing installers are going a million miles an hour and the average job the panels will go up in no time but doing a very high quality job on the accessories (outside corners, sidewall flashing, endwall flashing), closing all your profiles, installing butyl tape between any accessories and the deck sheet, all falls by the wayside. My lumberyard says they pretty much never ship any butyl tape with a roof package, we are one of the rare ones who ever ordered it.

There will likely be just as many metal roofs torn off and replaced in years to come as there are asphalt. The only bonus is they can go to the steel recycling where the shingles most always end up in the landfill.

[Mark Bolton]

Is there an inexpensive way to keep debris that falls during re-roofing from covering reflective insulation in attics?

Inexpensive, no.

Your best bet if your concerned (forget about now because it just is what it is) and want to do a quality job is to either skin the entire deck with sheet material over top of the 1x sheathing, or better yet tear off all the 1x's and install sheet sheathing directly to the rafters and be done with it. Putting anything over 1x sheathing is a nightmare and poor solution anyway. What happens when a course of nails lands on, or extremely close, to a joint in the sheathing and that course of nails is basically void because it didnt hit anything. 1x sheathing, especially old/dry/brittle, splits when its nailed into. Knots fall out, knots have already fallen out leaving holes. You'd be shocked how many of your roof nails wind up in, or near, these compromised areas of the roof deck.

Im not saying people dont smack shingles down over old 1x all the time and kiss it up to god that 80% fastener integrity, and the shingles gluing down in the sun, will keep them whole. But if your that concerned about a little bit of gravel/trash in the attic, and you really want to do a quality job, it is what it is and "cheap" likely wont play out well.

I would be far less concerned with with some gravel/debris in the attic than I would with regards to horrible fastener holding over 1x sheathing with a shingle install.

[Ron Selzer]

inexpensive, no.

Your best bet if your concerned (forget about now because it just is what it is) and want to do a quality job is to either skin the entire deck with sheet material over top of the 1x sheathing, or better yet tear off all the 1x's and install sheet sheathing directly to the rafters and be done with it. Putting anything over 1x sheathing is a nightmare and poor solution anyway. What happens when a course of nails lands on, or extremely close, to a joint in the sheathing and that course of nails is basically void because it didnt hit anything. 1x sheathing, especially old/dry/brittle, splits when its nailed into. Knots fall out, knots have already fallen out leaving holes. You'd be shocked how many of your roof nails wind up in, or near, these compromised areas of the roof deck.

Im not saying people dont smack shingles down over old 1x all the time and kiss it up to god that 80% fastener integrity, and the shingles gluing down in the sun, will keep them whole. But if your that concerned about a little bit of gravel/trash in the attic, and you really want to do a quality job, it is what it is and "cheap" likely wont play out well.

I would be far less concerned with with some gravel/debris in the attic than i would with regards to horrible fastener holding over 1x sheathing with a shingle install.

very well said

[Jim Becker]

I have a contract in place to re-roof my shop building with the work hopefully being done in a few weeks time. That contract (and the other proposals I got from contractors that did not get the job) all indicated that roofing work sometimes caused debris to fall on the inside of the structure and that it's the building owner's responsibility for both any damage and cleanup. That may be different in other states...but it appears to be "normal" here.

[Stephen Tashiro]

either skin the entire deck with sheet material over top of the 1x sheathing, or better yet tear off all the 1x's and install sheet sheathing directly to the rafters and be done with it..

That's a good idea for the next time the house needs to be re-roofed. However, I think the house been re-roofed several times since 1958. and there's no evidence of water damage to the 1x8's and the current roof is sound. I have a good view of the nails penetrating the underside of the roof deck. Perhaps the current roof was done by an old time contractor who took pains not to nail in the gaps. I can see that a modern roofer using a nail gun pop-pop-pop would be accustomed to nailing into a continuous surface and wouldn't take pains to miss gaps.

[Stephen Tashiro]

I have a contract in place to re-roof my shop building with the work hopefully being done in a few weeks time. That contract (and the other proposals I got from contractors that did not get the job) all indicated that roofing work sometimes caused debris to fall on the inside of the structure and that it's the building owner's responsibility for both any damage and cleanup. That may be different in other states...but it appears to be "normal" here.

I can understand why nobody wants to be responsible for re-roofing debris - and why articles on saving energy ignore it. It's a messy problem.

For example, articles on reflective insulation are written from the perspective that the reflective surface can be kept clean.

If a person follows the latest energy saving advice of foaming the underside of the roof deck, what happens if a section of the deck needs to be taken up and replaced? What happens if that section was foamed during construction before the drywall was put up and is now in an inaccessible part of the attic? There's probably a way to deal with this situation, but I haven't found an article about it.

[Brian Elfert]

Inexpensive, no.

Your best bet if your concerned (forget about now because it just is what it is) and want to do a quality job is to either skin the entire deck with sheet material over top of the 1x sheathing, or better yet tear off all the 1x's and install sheet sheathing directly to the rafters and be done with it. Putting anything over 1x sheathing is a nightmare and poor solution anyway. What happens when a course of nails lands on, or extremely close, to a joint in the sheathing and that course of nails is basically void because it didnt hit anything. 1x sheathing, especially old/dry/brittle, splits when its nailed into. Knots fall out, knots have already fallen out leaving holes. You'd be shocked how many of your roof nails wind up in, or near, these compromised areas of the roof deck.


A local Boy Scout camp had a building that needed a new roof that had 1x sheathing with gaps. After the shingles were removed the whole building was moving from side to side. They made a last minute decision to sheet the whole thing with OSB to strengthen it. Luckily, they had a load of OSB slated for another project that they used and then ordered another delivery of OSB for the other project.

They didn't remove the 1x sheathing for time and because it was probably the only thing holding up the building at that point.

[Jerome Stanek]

Is this a truss roof or rafters. With rafters just staple plastic visqueen to the bottom or use some cheap drop clothes

[Mel Fulks]

Mark, good stuff. The blanket of shingles thing reminds me of when I was a kid and heard someone say their roof had
been blown off . I would always ask "how could a roof get blown off?". Our present house had a cedar shake roof when we bought it.
When we replaced it we used the company that my then boss always used. He said that you did not tell them anything but what kind of
roof and what color. They only do high quality. Every roof is hand nailed. That should at least make the blanket easy to
find. I did think of one improvment over their standard ,that was copper at base of vent pipes instead of those rubber
boots. They made them quickly while standing on the roof , and they cover the whole pipe and are bent over at top edge.

[Tom M King]

I would think that if they took the shingles off from the top, down, that the junk would roll down the roof.

Talking about a dirty roof, we took off a Cypress shingle roof that was 165 years old, and a hundred yards from a railroad track. Fortunately, that house never had any insulation in it, so all the soot was vacuumed up from off the wooden lath, and lime plaster ceiling. It was pure black soot. We didn't keep track of how many of the yellow Shop Vac bags were used.

[Mark Bolton]

I did think of one improvment over their standard ,that was copper at base of vent pipes instead of those rubber
boots. They made them quickly while standing on the roof , and they cover the whole pipe and are bent over at top edge.

Yeah, copper or lead roof jacks at pipes are a super high end detail that I've never seen on any level I've operated on. I'd guess on they'd be a $500+ per penetration option at best but would be a super nice detail for sure if you can get it. It'd seem rare in day to day work. Be a bummer on some of these homes today with lazy plumbers who don't consolidate their vents below the roof deck into a single penwtration and stab 3-4 vent pipes through the roof lol.

[Tom M King]

I used these on Cypress shingle roofs, but made the ones for the copper roof, like Mel was talking about.

https://classicgutters.com/product/copper-roof-vent-pipe/

They sell aluminum ones too, but I've never used one of those.