Replies

1. 
   RogerDumas | Jan 02, 2004 08:29pm | #1

   Not sure from the description if you are talking about something like this or something else.  I pie cut the shingles.  The way I did it was to cut the corner of the shingle that would be cut away at teh window so that I could slide the shingle along the straight edge and get it close to the window.  Then I used a set of "dividers" (don't know if others use different terminology) to transfer the curve from the window edge to the shingle.  Make sure you keep the dividers parallel to the straight edge (that is, don't turn the dividers as you follow the curve).  Then I used a hand-held scroll saw to cut the shingles.  Good luck!

   "Regime change starts at home"

   
1. 
   gdavis62 | Jan 02, 2004 10:10pm | #2

   Not exactly, but your work is awesome.  Nice car, too.  What's the one inside the garage?  And the fish, is it a salmon?  Cod?

   Correcting my earlier post, my archtop windows will have about a 72" top-edge-of-trim radius.  I did a little layout with CAD using shingles with a 5" exposure, and here is what I did.

   The starter and first course above the window trim band are straight cuts with shingles at 3-7/8" width.  At the bottom corners, they are gapped 1/8", and because they are not pie-cut, the gap grows to just under 1/2" at the line of the next shingle course.  The next course shingles, being on a bigger radius, are all ripped to about 4-1/8", with the same gaps at bottom corners.  The gap at the 5" course line is shrinking as things move up.  In three or four more courses, we will be getting more close to parallel, and may be able to use shingles at random width.

   It looks like the key to doing this with straight-cut shingles is to have a large enough starting radius, an appropriate common width for the starter course, and rip shingles to the same width each course for the first few courses, growing the widths as we move up.  Sounds like a fun shingling project to me.

   You can see in the CAD layout, on the right, where the horizontal courses come in at the same 5" exposure.  The transition line from arched to level is not radial with the arch, but it is straight.

   We can use a compass as you described to scribe each next course line, being careful to keep the scribe radial, or maybe even spike a board across the window opening, and do it with a large trammel, with pencil-holes drilled 5" apart along the length of the bar.

   
1. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 01:40am | #4

   another possibility.... one course of shingle trim .. then revert to conventional coursing..

   this shingle trim was all cut on  a bandsaw....Mike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore

2. 
   seeyou | Jan 03, 2004 12:09am | #3

   Nice work.

1. 
   RogerDumas | Jan 03, 2004 01:50am | #5

   Thanks Micro and Greencu,

   It's a striped bass (the favorite fish around here).  Your picture helps a lot.  I haven't done anything like that before but I suspect that you'll end up cutting a lot of shingles shaped like this.  It does sound like a really fun project and I'd love to see some pictures when you're done!

   BTW, there was no other car in the garage.  It was (and still is) too filled with "stuff" to actually get a car in there!"Regime change starts at home"

1. 
   RogerDumas | Jan 03, 2004 02:05am | #6

   Here's another view.

   BTW, Mike Smith is the guru on shingling.  He's given me tips that have transformed my approach to shingling.  He's 'da man!""Regime change starts at home"

1. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 02:13am | #7

   roger... i would say it's you who inspires me.... but anyways.. enuf of this love-fest

   was driving along seaside ave.. and came upon this pale image of one of your fish... the wind was blowing about 30  gusting to 40 so the jumpy camera.. i'll go back and get a better one  ..

   'bout time for a finished pic of your "whale" wouldn't you say ?Mike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore

2. 
   RogerDumas | Jan 03, 2004 02:47am | #8

   Mike,

   You gave me tips that were invaluable.  We even got them published in the "Best of Breaktime"!  I used your tips tiday! 

   Here's a pic of the whale tail.  It's aging well (and doesn't leak)!"Regime change starts at home"

3. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 03:03am | #9

   as they say in P'town... finestkind..

    i've never seen better than yours.... even Guertin pales in comparisonMike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore

4. 
   Lateapex911 | Jan 03, 2004 06:37am | #13

   Mike and Roger...where can we find those tips today? I keep my back issues, is there a number?Jake Gulick

   [email protected]

   CarriageHouse Design

   Black Rock, CT

5. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 07:10am | #14

   jake.. i don't know what roger is referring toMike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore

6. 
   gdavis62 | Jan 03, 2004 04:10am | #10

   Love your work, Roger.  It must take a lot of planning, drawing, template-making, etc., to execute it.

   Up here where I am, if we were doing stuff like that, the livestock models would be more like porcupines, fishers, bears, maybe a whitetail.  A lot of high-end camps are using birchbark (it's free) to accent their gable ends.  Also logs (they're also free, sort of).

   But really, to do a simple up-and-over shingle roll, over an arch-top (with springline) window, do we really need to get out the jigsaws or bandsaw and do all that coping?  Can't we just rip and roll?

   I refined my model, making solids of all the sample shingles, and here is a copy of the rendering.  All shingles are 15-1/2 inchers, exposure is 5", and the maximum gapping you see to the weather is 7/16".

   Think it'll leak?

   
7. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 05:30am | #11

   gene... whites will shrink and curl.. and exagerate the openings..

    but you may get away with it..

    if you are going to use an R&R ( like a Maibec ) shingle for the body... they will be tight.. so your arch has to be just as tight..

    if you switch to red cedar.. and they  are R&R's then you will have to be very exacting with your fit, or they will just look like junk..

   whatever you set the tone with on the body of your work is what will have to be followed on your arch.. i'm not sure i'd want to devote that much attention to nice work if i were using white cedars..Mike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore

8. 
   gdavis62 | Jan 03, 2004 07:18am | #15

   Here is a photo of the prototype house, showing the shingled gable detail.  I'll bet they used western reds.

   In my color scheme, shingles will be brown, trim will be deep forest green.

   Pie-cutting these from R&Rs so the margins are parallel will be tedious, which is why I did the CAD study to examine using rips.  What do you think they did out in MN where they built this originally?

   
9. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 08:10am | #16

   my guess is they set up a trammel in the middle of the double  hung window below to strike their arcs for each course..

   i'd set up  my staging .. and prefab most of the shingle cuts on the ground.. it's going to be repetitive cuts..

    and that looks pretty formal.. so i'd figure it for red cedar R&R's  ( 18")Mike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore

10. 
    RogerDumas | Jan 03, 2004 09:53am | #17

    Micro,

    Maybe you could go the trapezoid route.  Draw the arc with the desired radius and use a perendicular to the arc to figure out each edge of a pattern shingle.  The rip a bunch on teh table saw (as in the enclosure).  As Mike says, if you don't you're gonna have a lot of growing gaps near the top of each row.  Anyway, that's how I'd do it for a pattern with that large a radius (I think). 

    Mike, I posted a question a long time ago about speeding up the shingling process.  You had a bunch of suggestions.  I did use some of them today (see second pic).  Anyway, they posted my question and a lot of your suggestions in one of the FHB issues.  I'd have trouble finding the issue though in my pile of magazines (FHB, On the Water, Road and Track...  :-)

    Jake, I haven't had the little white car on the track in  three years.  I keep promising myself that this will be the year but...  My wife got me the three-day Skip Barber school at Lime Rock last year for my 50th.  Man what a blast!  I definitely want to get back out there one of these years...

    Good night, everybody.  I just woke up after falling asleep on my chair in front of the tube.  Time to go to the real bed!"Regime change starts at home"

    
11. 
    RogerDumas | Jan 03, 2004 10:24am | #18

    One more picture.  This one is a little more accurate..."Regime change starts at home"

    
12. 
    gdavis62 | Jan 03, 2004 06:02pm | #21

    And here is a simple ripping sled jig for making the piecut shingles that will track across the arc.  It'll zip across the jobsite tablesaw.  To further ease assembly on the wall, all shingles are piecut to the same angle, with the shingle butt width (the chords) at each successive course enlarging by a common difference.  The joints will all thus fall smack center under each next upper shingle.  It'll look like cadets in formation.  Quite formal.  We will pick nice wide bedsheet shingles to make the pattern-cut transition pieces where the arcs end at the horizontal courses.

    If you look closely at the pic of the gable of the prototype house, the transition pieces all have little radius cuts, not sharps, at the arc/horizontal meeting point.  That was probably done as a "fudge-ease" so as not to have to line up in precision, up across the arc ends.  Those Norwegian carpenters out there think of everything!

    In the photo, you are looking at the house with the monster cross-gable roof, I threw up earlier re it's roof frame.  I am waiting for the TrusJoist engineer to get back with roof member sizing.

    
13. 
    johnharkins | Jan 04, 2004 03:18am | #22

    great project Micro and we've all lucked out w/ feedback from the best!

    I don't think Mike works on a house unless it has shingles - after multi - lite windows my favorite architectural feature  & hot damn! a whale's tail  and that elevation is a gem Tom

    your jig is the dance Mr Micro  and remember as you go up a straight line from any two points on your arc will give you a base for a perpendicular to give you that angle for your edge cut ( which in theory never changes but we know different eh )

    a little twist i like is to get those two bottom courses ( inc starter course ) a wee bit proud of casing by wrapping the radius casing w/ say a 3/4 X 1" piece of benderboard like cedar ripping ( clear)  and tapering down to say 1/2" at the arc  edges

    bending the shingle out and over the radius casing and the window casing really set off that beautiful treatment you are about to undertake

14. 
    Lateapex911 | Jan 03, 2004 06:36am | #12

    Ahhh, when you sent me pics of your house a year or two ago, I was wondering about that detail (the tail)! Now I see it and man, that's impressive! And creative!

    I'll throw my praise in as well. Post more pics!

    Any chance to get that German machine on the track?? My race car kept me too busy to get the 911 out.  That's good and bad, i guess! My New Years resolution: the 911 goes to Lime Rock!Jake Gulick

    [email protected]

    CarriageHouse Design

    Black Rock, CT

2. 
   TommyC | Jan 03, 2004 02:22pm | #19

   Mr. Micro

   I have some pics on my web page.

   http://WWW.PRIMOCONSTRUCTION.COM

   Maybe they will help. Let me know.

   Thomas Collier

1. 
   xMikeSmith | Jan 03, 2004 02:31pm | #20

   Tom... nice site.. so.. how did you do the arch ?Mike Smith   Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore