Although the worst of the weather is behind us, in Cornwall the struggle is still on to get all our roof hooks in before dark as the days are still a little short.
A recent installation in Fowey which has a west facing roof got off to a very slow start. Scaffolding was up, it was a bright morning in sunny Cornwall and for the first time this year we all thought we were going to have dry start and an early finish. All the gear was loaded onto the scaffolding and the men were ready to roll until they stepped onto the ice rink! Immediately we knew there was an aspect of this job that we had not foreseen, a West facing roof, fibre slate, 40° pitch and an early March morning do not mix.
We rested the roof ladders over the ridge but couldn’t place a foot on the slate without sliding out, there was only one way forward, early lunch or ‘snap’ as it is called in many parts of Cornwall and the South West. By 9:30 -10:00 we were back in business on the roof, it didn’t help that the slates had been fixed by the local farmer who lived behind and told us that he had nailed them so tight he didn’t think a jack hammer would get them off, we got them off eventually after 2 days with 4 men wrestling, we got the old tiles off replaced them with new, cut and flashed with code 3 lead, our fourth successful install in Fowey was complete.
Another challenging install completed by Harvest Cornwall ‘ our future is renewable’.