Parts Of A Roof. Your Home’s Roof Explained Piece By Piece.
What are the parts of a roof? Your home’s roof is made up of many individual parts that make up the whole of the roof when everything is put together. It may seem like a simple concept, but there are a lot of elements that play off of each other in order to help properly protect your home and your family from the elements outside. In today’s article, we’re going to explore the various parts of your home’s roof and break down each one individually so that you can see what exactly makes up the roof that may be over your head right this very moment!
The Basic Components Of A Roof
The Roof Frame
The roof frame serves as the roof’s structural skeleton. It is made up of strong boards that make up the rafters or trusses that support the roof deck above. Without the roof frame, your roof deck would not be able to attach to your home and would not be as well supported. The roof frame also provides your home’s overall shape and appearance. A strong roof frame is able to bear the weight of external forces like snow and rain and heavy winds. Without it, your house would collapse at the slightest wind or snow storm!
The Roof Deck
The roof deck is essentially the foundation upon which the rest of the roof rests. Also known as the roof sheathing, the deck provides valuable structural support to your roof and allows things like shingles and other roofing components to be attached. These days, the roof deck is typically made of large sheets of sturdy plywood that serve both as a surface for your asphalt shingles but also as a way to prevent water and air from leaking into your house from the outside. In a way, it helps to waterproof your home. It also helps to distribute weight applied to your roof evenly, rain or shine.
Roofing Underlayment
The underlayment part of your home’s roof can be easily overlooked, but it is almost the most important part of your roof as a whole! The underlayment is a barrier that protects your roof decking and the roof frame and the rest of your house for that matter from damaging moisture brought about by weather. This important barrier helps to protect the vulnerable wood of the roof deck from rotting, leaking, and breaking apart. It keeps your home dry and safe! Roof underlayment can be made out of many things but it is typically made of felt materials that have been saturated in asphalt liquids, synthetic polymer weave, and even rubberized asphalt coated underlayment that can be self-adhered. There are lots of different types of underlayment and they all help to keep moisture out.
The Roof Covering AKA The Roofing Materials
Now, this is the one that most people are familiar with. The roof covering is what you will see as you walk or drive by your average home in your neighborhood. The coverings come in many different styles and compositions, but the most common are asphalt shingles. Other types of roofing materials include metal panels, clay tiles, wooden shakes, or even slate. These are the first line of defense against harmful UV rays, rain, snow, and wind. This is the material that is most subjected to the abuse and wear and tear of the elements. Different materials have different lifespan and designs, so choose the one that’s right for your area and style and budget.
Roof Flashing
Flashing is not as well known or understood as the roofing materials like asphalt shingles, but it is equally as important in the battle to keep harmful water out of your home, year after year. Flashing is the metal or plastic pieces that are fastened to the areas of your roof around chimneys, skylights, roof vents or vent pipes, even around edges and joints. The area where a pipe or chimney or vent protrudes out of your roof is not naturally watertight. There will always be small gaps between the vent or chimney structure and the rest of the roof. If you have flashing, you can create a watertight seal that helps to join the roof seamlessly to your roofing appliances that are also needed for a home to function properly.
Roof Vents (Various Types)
As much as we want to and need to completely seal off the outside weather from entering our home through the roof, we still need to be able to strategically let some air flow both in and out of our home. That’s where roof vents come in. There are several kinds of roof vents, the most common being bathroom fan vents and kitchen stove exhaust vents. Those vents help to keep moisture and smoke from building up in your bathroom and kitchen respectively but, there are several others that help to keep your house working properly. Gable vents, soffit vents, and ridge vents also help to allow hot air from being trapped in your attic while also being able to pull cooler air into your home through the foundation vents. Vents help to save you real money each month on heating and cooling costs and they are an important part of your home’s roof.
In Conclusion
For The Road
Understanding the various parts of your home’s roof is important to knowing how your home functions overall as its own self-regulating ecosystem. Each part, no matter how small, serves a vital function that goes a long way to making your home a safe, comfortable, and sustainable environment for you and your family. The more you know about how your roof works, the better that you can help to keep it maintained and working properly for years to come. If you have any questions or concerns about your roof from the roof frame to the roof vents, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us. The experts here at Idaho Roofing Contractors are happy to help you with any and all of your roofing services related questions. Remember, take care of your roof so it can take care of you.
