While repairing your roof without professional guidance may cut costs in the short term, it’s not always a long-term fix.

If your roof needs some repairs, do some research to administer a proper fix. If you have any questions or are uncomfortable, seek the guidance of a qualified roofing contractor so you don’t make common roofing mistakes.

Homeowners often make errors, unknowingly, when they make routine repairs to their roof. Recognizing the problems and correcting them can keep your roof in top-shape condition, and safe from the spring elements.

Inadequate fastening

Nails and fasteners that keep the roof deck together and the shingle roofing adhered to the deck can be a sign of sub-par installation, and can pierce the shingles. Remove the loose or mislaid nails and replace with new. Use up to six nails per shingle, laid right under the seal-down strip of the shingle. Replace cracked shingles at this time.

Shingle roof selection problems

Choosing a shingle that has a continuous seal-down strip can contribute to leaks. Select a shingle product that has breaks in the adhesive between each strip; this prohibits water from seeping under the shingle. When repairing roofs with valleys, make sure to add flashing at the angle to prevent water damage.

Flashing problems

Metal flashing is used to stop water from seeping in around chimneys, valleys, windows and skylights. The misplacement of flashing can create leaks. Chimney flashing must be set into mortar to serve its purpose; repairing with caulk is a common mistake. Misalignment of step flashing is also common. Flashing pieces should overlap approximately 2 inches and be fastened with just one nail in the upper corner.

What Can You Learn from Our Work Gallery?

When you visit any roofer's work gallery, you're going to see pictures of roofs. Maybe of buildings, too, but mostly roofs.

As you look at one photo of another of roofs, you may wonder what you're looking for. Can you really tell the quality of a roof by looking at a gallery photo? Can you, if you're not a roofer, tell anything from looking at a photo?

Here are some things that you can learn from a gallery, no matter how much knowledge you have about roofing:

• How many jobs has the roofer done? Our gallery shows just a small percentage of the jobs we've done, and it features lots of beautiful roofs in Kansas and Missouri. Since we've been building roofs in the Kansas City area for more than three decades, it's easy for us to choose a nice representative sampling. If you're considering a roofer who shows only two or three jobs in the gallery, ask why.
• Has the roofer done the kind of work you need done? A roofer whose gallery shows only residential work might not be qualified to do your commercial job, and vice versa. If none of the jobs involve complex roof lines and you have an old house with an interesting roof, that roofer might have problems getting your job completed satisfactorily.

If you're not sure what you're looking at, ask. We're proud of our work, and we'll be glad to talk with you about the jobs we've done. 

TAMKO Roofing Materials

At Bill West Roofing, we believe in using the best materials. We've been around for more than 35 years, so you can see that we take the long view.

One of the suppliers we depend on is TAMKO. TAMKO is a Missouri company just like us. They started out in the late 1940s in Joplin, planning to have a presence in Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma. That's where the name came from.

By now, TAMKO has a national presence, and is one of the top suppliers of roofing materials. They offer lots of different colors and types of materials. One of the newest items is roofing material designed to keep your home cool. By choosing light colors (TAMKO has tested and certified the specific colors that work best) you can save a bundle on your air conditioning costs this summer.

Call us to ask about cool roofs.