Roof Progress

A lot has gone on! We applied for a Certificate of Appropriateness from the ACC Historic Preservation Commission. We asked for permission to

1. change the main roof from asphalt shingles to metal
2. change the front porch roof from tar over metal to TPO (a membrane)
3. take down a small chimney at the back of the house which was probably built to vent a no longer extant gas water heater.

We received permission to do 2 & 3, but the HPC feels that metal roofs are not historically appropriate in our neighborhood. Although in the past, the commission has approved metal roofs in Cobbham (including both metal shingle and galvalume grand rib), the current commission seems very opposed to them in general, and we could not document that our house ever had a metal roof (indeed, it almost certainly did not.)

I enjoyed attending the HPC meeting (although I was very nervous when I had to speak!) and I probably should have gone to a meeting before applying for a CoA to get the lay of the land. For future projects, I will be better informed. The Staff Preservation Planner's report noted that the Sanborn map for 1960 shows the front porch as going across the front of the house only (it currently wraps), and she thought it probably had a sloped roof at that time. Since the porch pillars are the same all around, and the roof is currently flat, it seems likely that the entire porch dates after 1960 (and before 1989, when it appears in its current form in photos on a CoA application for the rear dormer.) This will allow us more flexibility in roof work in the future, since the roof is not original to the house and not a very historical feature. (Though we like it and don;t plan to change it.)

So we are looking at other roof options for making our upstairs cooler (yesterday it was 98 and sunny and with the AC set at 76 and the bathroom vent fan and ceiling fans on, the upstairs was 91 degrees in the middle of the afternoon). Michael has identified three manufacturers of architectural shingles that meet the Federal Energy Star guidelines for reflective/heat-radiating coatings.

• Owens Corning
• GAF-ELK Timberline Cool Series
• CertainTeed Landmark Solaris

He has also found at least one article about construction methods for cool roofs. We're meeting with our builder tomorrow to discuss this Plan B.