Roofing Dallas as Compared to Other Cities

Roofing varies state to state, not just in installation traditions but in color and styles available.In the Dallas area there are several roofing factories. GAF, Tamko, Atlas, Certainteed, Tamko, all have a presence here with GAF having two factories, one the old Elk plant.

If you go to any of the manufacturer sites you’ll see a zip code selector for colors and, of course, contractors. GAF, for example shows a WeatherMax and Marquis but in my 31 years as a contractor and eight years as an installer before that, I’ve never seen them. One of my new sale techs sold some once and all hell broke out. We fixed it by, as my father says, passing it on to the consumer through reduced profits. I’m not really sure I fully fathom that anything was passed on.

A few years ago a client wanted exactly what he had on his roof. I knew it was a Tamko Heritage weathered wood and place the order. When he rounded the bend and looked down the hill he saw his roof darker than all the neighbors. I thought the manufacturer had changed the granule drop. I called Spec Roofing Supply and they told me they brought in product from Kansas City and it was darker. Never knew it. Never guessed it. Did my job, I thought, and now was in a pickle. The man was selling his house and was sure that it wouldn’t sell because it was different. So we sold all the neighbors roofs, as it had hailed in Coppell, and we put on the entire rainbow. The angry client was confused but he paid me about six months later.

In 1995 a lot of roofing was brought in from around the country from manufacturers that most roofers had never heard of or seen. These air nailing carpetbaggers did terrible jobs and now the roofing can’t be matched.
Besides having different colors and styles, roofing manufacturers have different drops, color mixtures with the same name, and even variations within the same plant due to the texture of the asphalt, temperature at application, or different pressures applied from different machines. This variation in pressure can influence how the roofing reflects light.
Then after all this comes the discontinuation of colors, the changing of the shapes and sizes and warranties.

GAF had the Timberline that started as an organic productwith a 25 year warranty. It went glass about 1980 and went to 30 years. When Elk put out the Prestique II 25 year product, GAF answered with a 25 year Woodline. Then it became a Woodline Plus, then Timberline 25. Atlas kept messing with the warranty and added 5 years to theirs making it a 35 year instead of a 30. Then everybody else changed their 25, 30, and 40 year products to 30, 40, and 50 years respectively. Then the 50 became lifetime.

GAF bought Elk, dropped most of its own colors and ran with the Elk ones.
Now you have a home in Dallas with a 30 year Timberline put on in the 1990’s and the insurance wants to pay you for a 30 year but you really have a 40 year.
The color doesn’t match and fading is not the reason. The length and width of the product don’t match and Allstate doesn’t care because the policies have exclusions. You know you should have read that policy.
Owens Corning calls its Weathered Wood by the name Driftwood and if you’re new to the business and use generic terms the supply house will send you a different color than you want.
All the manufacturers use the term “slate” to refer to a bluish hue don’t they. Yes, all but one. When ordering Tamko the term slate means dark brown.
Cedar means sand color, black is black, but slate and weathered wood can get you a mad client.
Dallas has seen a lot of materials come and go. The dance is endless. Now you have GAF products that you can get specialty ridges for in all the colors or some of the colors in some of the ridge styles, or they have their own particular ridge.
Some roofers cross brand manufacturers ridge and field product because they want to use a cheap 20 year ridge on their class IV lifetime roof.
We lost a roof to a janitor last December. We proposed using Armorshield II lifetime with a heavy ridge and Shinglemate felt. The job was to be hand nailed and everything on the roof was to be new. New stacks, new valleys, StormGuard on the penetrations… and everything.
The janitor used no felt, used 20 year class nothing for ridge and starter, replaced no pipes, metal edge, and put in no valley material. Then he shot it on with pistols.
It doesn’t matter, this house on Silverlake Rd in McKinney,75070, is for sale.
If the buyers inspector looks under the starter he might be able to tell the felt is the original but I doubt it. The problem will come when the roof gets older and has wind or hail damage. I’m sure the roofer, er, janitor, said “we used the old felt.”
Let’s get this straight:YOU CAN NOT REUSE FELT. Those word do not compute. The felt is mute. It is full of holes and does not meet the criteria for a subroof.
The worst part is the guy doesn’t even know he did a bad job because he’s not really in the business. He has no certifications, no formal training, no real understanding of what “system” means when referring to a roof system. Otherwise he would have put down at least 15 lb felt.
This example show that Certainteed makes 20 year three tabs, that he used for ridge, that match their 50 year class IV roofing. Most manufacturers take care to keep this from happening.
Since Jon Wright Roofing started in 1979 nothing is the same. Nothing.