Wooden roof – archaism or trend

Recommendation points

• How wood became a roofing material
• Elements of a wooden roof
• Shingle
• Ploughshare
• Shingles
• How shingles and shingles are made
• Characteristics of a wooden roof
• The unique property of a shingle roof

The article will tell you about a wooden roof. You will learn about the types of wooden roofing materials, the method of their production and the possibility of self-production. We will tell you about the advantages and unique properties of a wooden shingle roof.

A roof made of wood – sounds strange, and it is tempting to ask again: “You mean – a rafter system?” It will be about the protective roofing material made of wood. Yes it is possible. Moreover, such roofs, invented in ancient times, are back in fashion..

How wood became a roofing material

The invention of the wooden roof is associated with the need to have a roof over your head that would meet the following requirements:

• availability of finished material;
• ease of installation;
• lightness and at the same time tightness;
• ease of repair and maintenance;
• durability.

Wood easily copes with the first four points – it is a ready-made building material, it is easily and accurately processed with a simple tool (the carpenter’s craft is familiar to many), has an acceptable volumetric weight (800-1600 kg / cubic meter). The durability of wood outdoors can be questioned unless it is a coniferous species. Their fibers contain resin, which is a natural antiseptic and protects the wood from drying out and decay..

As a result, the service life of the uncoated material is 25 years, with the coating – 40 years.

Pitched roofing was not widely available before, but today there are no problems with inexpensive protective compounds. Wood species suitable for roofing: spruce, larch, aspen, pine.

Elements of a wooden roof

Shingle

This is a thin (10-15 mm) wooden plank or plate with dimensions of 100-280×300-600 mm – this element is correctly called “shingle”. In fact, it is a tile – hard, easy to install, but lighter than ceramic and does not prick.

Gontines are distinguished by the manufacturing method:

1. Chipped – the plate is chipped with special devices or machines from the debarked log. This method is characterized by a relatively large amount of waste (up to 25%) and plate structure (spalling irregularities).
2. Sawed – the plate is sawed off from a log or trunk on a sawmill. Such shingles have a relatively accurate size (+/- 1 mm), a low yield percentage (no more than 10%), but require special equipment – a sawmill or a machine.

Production of blocks from thin shingle on video

According to the functional section, shingles are:

1. Wedge-shaped or integumentary. One of the edges of the shingle is smaller than the opposite one, and this applies to both the longitudinal and transverse edges.
2. Direct or basic. The edges of the plate are of the same thickness – from such a shingle they create a base (the first layer or two). Also, straight plates are used for insulation and decoration..

By the way the ligaments are distinguished:

1. Grooved (grooved) – a groove is cut in a thick edge for mounting a thin edge of an adjacent shingle into it.
2. Groove-free – the edges have no grooves – overlapping installation.

The shingle roof was created and is being created in areas where there is a risk of strong wind.

Video – production of shingles on a sawmill

Ploughshare

A special type of shingle, it is a separately taken carpentry product that requires a lot of experience and a steady hand. Each element is created from a template and adjusted in place, based on the individual curves of the base. Such a roof can be found on the monuments of wooden architecture.

Shingles

Shingles with a thickness of 3 to 6 mm, sometimes called chips. Such precision of cutting became possible only with the development of blacksmithing and the creation of thin saws. The benefit from the use of shingles was a greater yield of finished material from a unit of raw materials. Simply put, one barrel produced 30% more quality plates than shingles. However, the cutting itself was and remains a time consuming process, or requires bulky equipment (band saw through passage).

The shingle has no nuances in its structure, it is just a thin plate with variable properties – it bends only in one direction.

How shingles and shingles are made

The simplest option for today is the option of a wooden roof made of thin shingles. The main laboriousness of creating a roof is material preparation. For 1 sq. m requires tens of thick shingles and hundreds of thin sheets. Modern saws allow you to harvest shingles and shingles from 3 to 18 mm quickly and in large quantities.

Making shingles on a circular

With such a productivity and speed, the problem of the workpiece is solved simply – sheets can be bought, or rather, ordered at a sawmill with such a machine.

Attention! Shingles are not stored for future use. A freshly cut sheet begins to warp after a week, but the shingles installed in the roofing system no longer warp.

Of course, such a machine is a costly business, but some craftsmen copy its basic structure at home..

Homemade shingle machine on video

In simple terms, a shingle is a huge shavings, and a machine is a modified plane. With shingles, the situation is more complicated. Hand-chopped shingles and plowshares are the lot of craftsmen and very time-consuming work.

Handmade shingle on video

Also, the plates can be pricked using a “flapper” – an ax with a limiter mounted on a movable power lever. A tree trunk is used as a lever – it gives the necessary force to break the plate. This method involves the work of two people, so it goes much faster.

Video – how the “mahalo” works

Characteristics of a wooden roof

Of course, a roof made of wood is not perfect, but it has its advantages..

Benefits:

1. Cheap, affordable raw materials.
2. Sustainability.
3. Interesting appearance.
4. Breathable roofing cake.
5. Natural removal of condensate.
6. All work after lathing is carried out with one material.

Disadvantages:

1. Time consuming installation requiring professional skills and knowledge.
2. Fire hazard.

The unique property of a shingle roof

The roofing cake is arranged in at least 4-6 layers, on a sloping slope. Shingle sheets are located at an angle, but at the same time they have natural ventilation ducts through which moisture-saturated air passes. Condensate settles on an inclined plane and simply flows down the roof under gravity. Thus, wooden shingles perform the following functions:

1. Precipitation protection (replaces roofing material).
2. Insulation (replaces insulation).
3. Superdiffusion membrane (replaces membrane).

Shingles do not require a reverent attitude during installation, like modern materials (sealing, filing, vapor barrier, additional layers and actions). At the same time, the caked roof the next year after installation is strong enough for walking on it, it does not fade or heat up in the sun, paint does not peel off from it, it does not rot. The cost of 1 sq. m sheet of finished shingles – about 4 cu e. (depends on the type of wood).

In an age of rapid technological development, the creation of roofing material from solid wood seems at least out of date. It would seem that enough roofing materials have been invented and put on the market, but the fashion for ecological construction is increasingly turning our attention to the origins. The ancient methods of building from wood are no less popular and desirable today than at the time of their discovery – and a roof made of wood is an excellent confirmation of this. In the next article we will talk about how to mount a wooden roof with your own hands..