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Thread: Metal Roof Question

  1. #1
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    Metal Roof Question

    Hope I do not get in trouble asking this question here, I just do not know where to ask and trust. I have a cabin with a very nice looking, plain metal finish roof. Looking at buying a pole barn garage package to install alongside. Pole Barn folks tell me unpainted metal roof will rust out in 10 years. What is on my house? Are there plain metal finishes with 30-40 year warranties? Or is my roof painted, and I just do not know it?
    Last edited by Mike OMelia; 12-12-2018 at 9:59 PM.

  2. #2
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    Most metal roofs a few years old are painted... Galvanized metal roofs if painted about every 10-15 years (or longer) will last well over a hundred years or more..
    The paint is most often silver, the same color as the metal, and is VERY thin and very easy to apply..
    Even an unpainted metal roof will normally last 40-50 years unless leaves or something accumulates on it to hold the water in one spot, especially if it is very flat metal roof.
    The newer metal roofs have a baked on painted surface which will last many lifetimes...

  3. #3
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mike OMelia View Post
    Hope I do not get in trouble asking this question here, I just do not know where to ask and trust. I have a cabin with a very nice looking, plain metal finish roof. Looking at buying a pole barn garage package to install alongside. Pole Barn folks tell me unpainted metal roof will rust out in 10 years. What is on my house? Are there plain metal finishes with 30-40 year warranties? Or is my roof painted, and I just do not know it?
    I just installed metal on my well house. It is small, but I went with corrugated core ten (606a) material. It is 22ga. I think you have to look at each specific metals thickness before you can say it will last, or not, and a major determinant will be gauge. Some of the plain galvanized rooting is 26 or 28 ga. They should list it as “tin foil”.

  4. #4
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    The places around here that sell metal roofs say you have the option for a 10 or 40 year warranty on the paint.

  5. #5
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    Google "galvalume warranty" and see what you can find. It's an aluminum- Zinc coating, similar to galvanizing, and what comes on the rolls of metal that metal panel manufacturers use, not including the cheap 5V tin you can get in the box stores. The company that I buy metal roofing from only guarantees what Galvallume they carry for 10 years, whereas you can get the "painted" (not really paint, but a fancy coating) with a 40 year warranty. Other metal rollers may vary, but none of them manufacture the metal they use. It comes coated on the rolls they buy.

    Don't think that any brand name of roofing metal is better than another. There are many more rolling plants, than there are metal manufacturers. Most even use the same color charts, and color names. Buy from your closest rolling plant. Most of the cost of what you order from a box store will be cost of shipping, that's included in the product price. I can pick up from the one that I deal with, 25 miles away, and the price is almost exactly half of what it can be ordered from Lowes for.

    It's also nice to cut out the middle man in placing the order, because they will custom make any trim piece like I want it. For instance, I did one roof with a really long valley, and they custom folded three pieces the length of their computerized brake that nested perfectly together. You can't do that just ordering valley pieces from Lowes.
    Last edited by Tom M King; 12-12-2018 at 10:41 PM.

  6. #6
    One house we did mill work for had a stainless steel roof coated with ,I think,zinc to make it paintable. I think they call
    it Tern coated. That's the best type I know of.

  7. #7
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    Do you get Colorbond in the USA? It's zincalume plated steel with factory applied colour over the top and roll formed in a multitude of profiles. It lasts for decades. Cheers

  8. #8
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    Medina Ohio
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    My barn and house each have a metal roof barn is 28 years old and still looks new

  9. #9
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mel Fulks View Post
    One house we did mill work for had a stainless steel roof coated with ,I think,zinc to make it paintable. I think they call
    it Tern coated. That's the best type I know of.
    Follansbee Steel, the company that made Terne coated, went out of business in something like 2011 or 12. The roll formed roofing steel put them out of business. I hadn't heard of it being put back on the market since then.

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by Wayne Lomman View Post
    Do you get Colorbond in the USA? It's zincalume plated steel with factory applied colour over the top and roll formed in a multitude of profiles. It lasts for decades. Cheers
    There are Many such companies here, under many different names, but it's all close to the same stuff.

  11. #11
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    This one should be good for at least another 600 years. This is the road side of a lake house I built in 1991. I was considering putting Terne coated stainless on it, but copper was about the same price at the time. I paid 90 cents a pound for seven 1,000 pound rolls of copper. Today, it was $10 a pound the last time I looked.


  12. #12
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    Very nice roof Tom.

    I have always liked metal. I have a “flat” (2/12 or something like that) roof, and am told that is too low for metal. Also too low for shingles according to what I read, but a lot of my neighbors seem to have done that.

  13. #13
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    I have put a standing seam metal roof on a low pitch, maybe even lower than that. I don't know if the warranty is any good, or not, but it hasn't leaked.

    The company I buy such metal from is in South Hill, Va. I don't know how far that is from you, but I like dealing with them a lot. I think the last standing seam metal I bought from them was something around $1.25 a square foot, but I picked it up myself.

    The hip roofed porches on this house were not original, but they wanted to keep them(exact match on the back too). The slope is no more than 2/12, and maybe even 1/12. I put 24 ga. white standing seam roofs on them, and they have never leaked.
    Last edited by Tom M King; 12-13-2018 at 9:00 AM.

  14. #14
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  15. #15
    We've put on quite a bit of classic rib metal and I will say there is most definitely a difference in quality from manufacturer to manufacturer. These pop-up roll formers that are the size of a trailer you tow behind a pickup are not capable of rolling the heavy stuff. Most all of it will be 29 gauge because the roll stock only comes from a few sources but the difference is in the finish thats put on the material. You'd be surprised the difference between some 29 gauge and other that has many coats of polyester prime and finish. Its really amazing. The cheap stuff you will waffle a rib instantly if you inadvertently step on one and you can feel the difference moving sheets around instantly

    We have installed, and I actually have on a little house of my own, the galvalume color which looks like raw but it is actually coated and carries the warranty.

    Im not really a fan of exposed fastener metal roofs but they are extremely popular here. Everyone touts them to last forever like the tin roofs of old but honestly they have the same cosmetic life span as good dimensional shingles and the shingles will look better when they are 40 years old than a painted tin roof will. Even with the modern finishes painted roofs will fade and chaulk in just a couple years and unlike the old farm house roofs not many today are going to enjoy their roof mopping on a thick coat of roof coating when it gets older. My prediction is you will be seeing a lot of tin roofs being replaced far before their warranty is gone because they either dont look good anymore or are failing due to installation issues.

    We always tried as hard as possible to never set foot on the metal as it was going in and handled it very gingerly. Your basically walking on the hood of your car which you wouldnt do. Any scratch in the material is a guaranteed rust initiator. When guys gun slips off the screw and slams the nut driver down into the tin, rust initiator. Dont pre-drill your holes and get a little curl of sheet metal whipping around from the drill point screws, rust initiator. Field cuts, rust. All of which is not covered by warranty. Install directly over asphalt shingles (commonly seen here) likely a void of the warranty.

    Im sure it varies from region to region but we had a conversation with a roofer who did a lot of tile roofs and he said they dont hardly use copper anymore because it doesnt last with the acid rain. Was always our go-to flashing for high end jobs. Heck around here you can barely find a commercial roof yard that stocks lead sheet or rolls anymore. Kills me to see people flashing off masonry and so on with aluminum trim coil or galvalume. Times change.

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