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Have any of you had any experience with metal roofs by a company called Dura Loc ? I am considering having one installed on my house and would like to hear any feedback before committing to this. I live in northern Minnesota where the winters are extreme. I am leaning towards the style that looks like clay tiles. These roofs are ridge vented and I am also wondering if I should add any gable venting as well.
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John, I install a lot of metal roofing in my area, and the stlye you're referring to is starting to show up in the supply houses I deal with. I usually install the 5-v aggricultural style "galvalume" from different manufacturers. My main supply house has been introducing the "dura-loc" as an alternative metal roofing material. I have shyed away from this product until I see it put up by another reputable contractor. I stay away from new products until I see them proven. I know this does not answer your question but I am interested to hear your feedback should you choose to go with the product. Thanx Jon J.
*Jon,The Dura Loc brand is manufactured in Ontario, Canada.....not far from Toronto. They have a large market in California right now, with the clay tile style, and I know there are some of their roofs in Southern Minnesota as well.....around Minneapolis. My contractor has never installed one of these type roofs, and he has arranged for the manufacturer to send a crew here to install my roof and to teach his crews how to do future installs. This sounds like a contractor that recognises his limitations and is going to do what he has to do in order to do it right. Am I being way to naive in this assumption ?
*Don't know about the Dura-Loc material, but as far as the venting....do not combine ridge/soffit vents with gable vents in the same attic space. The two venting systems can defeat each other. I will block existing gable vents(from the inside) when installing ridge/ soffit vents. Jeff
*Thanks Jeff. Are ridge vents the way to go ?
*Since no one seems to be answering...Speaking only as a long time reader of this board, if you must vent, then ridge vent is the way to go. But it is my understanding that a ridge vent without soffit vents is worse than useless. There should be a free passage for air from soffit vent to ridge vent.You might want to do a search on venting...read the posts of people who actually know what they're doing....instead of mine.Rich Beckman
*I'm back now! While I'm not a roofing expert, and the fact that the "experts" can't agree....in my opinion, ridge/soffit's are the way to go. As Rich said, only as a ridge and soffit combo, and with the right intake/outlet area. Definitely need free air passage to work correctly. If you have a soffit to vent, ridge vents can work on gabel, hip and shed roofs that tie into a wall. Not too dificult, but get the small details right. Ask the local roofing supply house. Jeff
*Why not ridge, soffit, and gable vents in the same attic space? Seems to me the more holes you've got, the more air that'll move.
*The cross flow of the gables disrupts the upflow of the soffit/ridge. The theory being, near the gable vents, some of the draft of the soffit gets sucked out the nearest gable vent, and the ridge loses the venting flow. Had a roofing rep show us at trade school a few years ago. He had all sorts of colorful diagrams, so he had to be right!!!If I remember right, they brought pizza for lunch, so in my eyes...the man was a genius!Jeff
*The theory for soffit vents combined with any exit device(turbines, power vents, ridge vents) is to draw cool air in a the base of the roof, cooling the attic and underside of the singles, and out through a exit vent. Gable vents funtion as a cross flow(non powered) vent, or can be used as a exit vent in a soffit/powered soffit vent.On a recent remodel(5000 sq. ft. house) we went back and add soffit vents to a house that for the last 20 years had only power roof vents. For twenty years this house had been sucking air from any source to the exterior(mainly interior conditioned air). When we cut the first few holes, it was like a vacumm sucking air and insulation into the attic(pretty cool)David
*Worked for a co. that owned several nursing homes.The attic temps in some of these new buildings were high enough to ruin the fireproofing in the roof sheathing so our corporate engineer was called into fix the problem. The solution was about half a dozen powered vents all over the roofs all thermostatically controlled with alarms, bells, whistles, and flashing lights.The job was done and he was so proud of this engineering marvel (venting a roof) that he invited all the corporate hot shots to come see the demonstration.Turned on the fans and about half the ceiling tiles in the place jumped out of the grids. Corporate officers very impressed.The engineer turned to me (director of maintenance) and snaped that those tiles should have been clipped down. I told him that he should have added vents for air to get into the attic instead of wasting all the airconditioning in the building sucking it out the roof.He told me, somewhat angrily, that this system was desingned to function perfectly. I looked slowly up at the gaping holes in the ceiling and said "Yup. You know best."