New Roof Skin:

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Well, here I am again with some more pictures for you:

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Here you will see the process of installing a new one piece aluminum roof skin.

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I was contacted by a person who had this aluminum roll in their warehouse about 800 miles from my home, but as luck would have it, I was scheduled to go there for work in a few weeks. So after the work project was done, I bought it, loaded it into the back of my pickup and took it home with me.

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It stood on end in my garage for a year and a half before I got to put it on.

First, lets have a look at the last bit of roof framing. The ends of the roof were rather a perplexing problem to solve. I wanted the roof skin to curve down over the ends to prevent leakage. Most RV roofs end up on top and have a seam - a potential leak problem. I felt that if I curved the roof down over the ends, water runoff would be better. The only problem was that the roof as I designed it, is peaked with a 19" flat area at the top. This would cause the roof skin to pucker when I rolled it over the ends. I had to redesign my original framing to help minimize puckering of the roof skin.

Click on image to enlarge:

Roof end framing:

I left this until the very last, as I could not figure a sure way to do it. I finally just dived in and made it work. Here is the open end just before fabricating the curve.

Roof curve fabrication:

See the wood blocks made to curve the roof skin over the ends?

Trial roof curve:

I put a piece of aluminum flat stock up there to try out the curve to see how much it would pucker, and if it was going to be a problem

Trial roof curve 2:

After tacking it in place, I determined that I could make it work with minimal problems.

Other end:

Same design as the front. if you look close, you can see how I modified the end rafter to start reducing the pitch.

It was actually a lot easier than I had originally thought to make sure the roof skin curved down over the front and rear. I finally got tired of trying to pre-plan it and just decided to roll it out and make it work. Re-sloping the rafters at the end of the roof helped a lot.

Old roof skin 1:

After rolling it up and rolling it back out dozens of times, I have finally rolled it up for the last time!

Ready for the "kickoff" !!

I'm ready to take the old galvanized roof skin off for the last time. I have waited a long time for this!

Out with the old!!

One swift kick and awayyyyyy it goes! Great photo by my son-in-law!

OK, time to get the new roof skin up there onto the roof. It was a bit of a grunt, but 2 of us walked up a pair of stepladders with the roll on our shoulders. Had to be careful not to drop it.

New roof skin roll:

It has been standing on end for long enough! I have waited a long time for this day!

New roof skin roll:

OK, I wrestled it out of my garage and laid it down here to start. . . . .

Sitting in place:

We packed it up onto the roof and now it's ready to roll out.

Ready to roll:

Here's what it looks like from the top.

Ready to roll 2:

Closeup shot of the roof skin roll.

Rolled out and ready:

Gotta measure and make sure the overhang is exactly the same on both sides.

Rolled out:

Same thing as viewed from the other side. I should move the car before I take pictures!

Back shot:

And a picture taken from the back. Time to start fastening it before the wind comes along!

 

I wanted to do this in the hotter weather with the sun shining, but it was Feb. 12/06 when I put the roof skin on. Aluminum expands and contracts quite a bit. If you put it on when its cold, the sun will cause it to expand when its hot and show wrinkles. Oh well, I will just do my best to stretch it!

Here's some details on the fastening process and also details of how I curved the aluminum to go over the back and front.

First step - bend it over:

I had to be very careful to keep the overhang equal as I went. I first used a pair of duckbills to establish the initial bend.

Sides preparation:

I raised the skin up onto blocks and applied a generous bead of elastomeric caulking to the underside before stapling it down.

Side bent over:

Another view of bending the roof over the sides. Blocks are out - caulking in place and ready to fasten.

Top view with sides ready to fasten:

It was getting a bit breezy, so I placed the lumber up there to prevent the roof from blowing off until I could get some staples in there.

Bending the edges:

After the initial bend, I used a rubber mallot to fold it over flat.

Back end view:

I left a little extra past the back end to make sure I had enough to do the curve.

Bending the skin over:

I devised a makeshift bender with a piece of ABS pipe and an aluminum angle.

Bending the curve:

The roof is thick, so I had to get some extra leverage by drilling holes in the pipe and inserting a jack handle. I inserted a piece of plywood as a work surface.

Bending the ends:

I got my son in law to operate the other end while we both cranked hard on the handles to bend the roof skin around the pipe.

Curved end view:

Theres the end result after removing the homemade bender.

Curved end view 2:

And a different view so you can see the curve.

Curved end view 3:

And another view. It was important to pre-establish the curve before trying to fasten it down.

Evaluating the "pucker factor":

This is the area where I had to really plan carefully - to make a peaked roof run over the ends without serious puckering. You can see it bulging a bit here.

Trimming the excess:

There is a wood strip in the framing to fasten to. Careful measuring here before trimming to make sure my staples hit the wood.

One end fastened down:

This was slow and tedious, but I got it to lay reasonably flat in spite of the peak in the roof.

Top end view:

Same thing viewed from higher - not too much of a wrinkle, but a bit is visible.

Overall view:

may as well show you the whole thing from up in the air a bit.

Closeup of front:

All fastened down now. You can see a bit of a wrinkle where I reduced the slope of the rafters to make the curve work better.

Corner closeup:

I used a pair of aluminum downpipe crimpers to create the curve at the corners.

Another corner view:

Those crimpers worked well for this task.

Overall view from back:

Ahhh - nice & shiny and reasonably smooth. I'm happy with the results.

Well, there's the new roof in place. Now I don't have to worry about water getting into the roof anymore. I have had enough of bailing water out of my work through leaky tarps.

Not sure what I'll post next. . . . Check the homepage from time to time - I am now dating the changes so you know when I have posted something new.

This page posted on June 15, 2006