Is Roofing a DIY Job – Tools

Roofer with pneumatic nailer

 This is one of the great advantages professionals bring.  We work with our tools every day, so we invest in quality tools and they pay us back.  Of course this is one of the greatest advantages of DIY jobs too; with the money you save you want more tools.  This is a universal of DIY-motivated homeowners => tools are good and more tools are better!!!
 
But it isn’t just the tools.  You need to understand how to use those tools to get the most out of them.  Every time you put a new tool in your hand, there is a learning curve.
 
A hammer, a Roofing Utility Knife, and a Hack Saw will get you a long way.  You could hammer every nail, and old timers certainly did it this way before pneumatic tools, but then there is skill to hammering nails as well (keep them straight, don’t smack your thumb, don’t underdrive the nails, and don’t damage the shingles).  Back to some basic math though, a typical roof is 30-squares, each square is 3-bundles, each bundle is 20-shingles, and each shingle takes 4-6 nails (this depends on roof slope and prevailing wind considerations) – this is right around 10,000 nails.  Have fun with that.
 
Again though, DIY jobs are about opportunity to buy a new tool.  For a job you are going to do once, you are probably shopping at the discount tool supplier.  Let me caution you to NOT do this; good tools are worth the investment.  If you are going to nail 10,000 nails, you will appreciate the difference by the end of the job.
 
Sure, you need a pneumatic coil nailer.  Now you need an air compressor too.  Are you going to be doing this by yourself, because if you have friends helping you (and those are GOOD friends), you need more nailers and you need a bigger air compressor.
 
But it isn’t just the tools either.  If you set the pressure to your air compressor too low, you will be finish hammering every nail in.  If you set the pressure to your air compressor too high, you will damage shingles and have to replace them.  If you don’t hold that nailer perpendicular to the roof, you won’t drive nails straight and this again damages shingles.  Sure, this isn’t brain surgery, but it isn’t something you pick up and use perfectly the first time either.
 
And this is simply a single tool you need.  Professional roofing contractors bring many other tools to the job, all professional grade, and more importantly we aren’t learning to use new tools on your roofing job.

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