I am trying not to die while cleaning roofs and so far have done ok but trying not tempting fate not being harnessed. So far shingle hasn’t been bad but metal roofs are just the worst. Everything I’m seeing requires me to drill holes and maybe I’m just not looking up the right words on google but I’m not finding much.
From my research I’ve found that pretty much everything is terrible while the metal roofs are wet. There are these things that attach to seams but I wonder if these are substantial enough for roofs like this…
I wasn’t even able to get on this roof as it was so mossy that I would have slid right off so I had to use a brush to knock it down and hopefully make a path to climb up to top before I can even attempt to clean debris off tomorrow. It’s super sketchy and I just want to try and be safe in the future.
There are 2 types of good metal working boots. One has foam pads on the bottom to give you grip and they work good even when wet. I also have magnetic boots for metal roofs which give some additional grip.
As for anchors yes we use the ridge pro (never tried it with a metal roof tho)
Or if you have a long enough rope you can anchor to a tree or something sturdy on the ground
Get a basic harness setup from HD, comes in a bucket - then secure a rope from one side of roof to the other snuggly. Tie some knots in it with small loops you can secure to. I try to put loops near ridge. the play in your harness rope will let you get about 15’ either side of loop along ridge. Having ground guy helps so they can move rope if you need while you sit on ridge, if it’s a long stretch of roof.
Do you just throw it up there on the ridge or screw it in? I’ve seen these but feel like it might be hard to talk people into screwing I to their roof.
What is the name of those boots with foam? I have not seen them on the Google machine.
You read my mind. I’m headed to home depot shortly but unfortunately I don’t think they have the bucket setup. Just a 49 and a 99$ harness which are both Werner. I’ll have to buy other stuff separately.
When tying off to trees what knots do you use? I have seen that they require at least 4 wraps around a tree. I was thinking about using a variation of the clove hitch, called the super clove hitch which involves 4-5 wraps and then a clove hitch with a long tail just in case.
Heck, you’re the seaman. you’ve forgotten more about knots than I’ll ever know. I just wrap it around tree a few times and tie 2-3 knots in it, lol. Friction on tree main thing. not holding up a ton. If they have one of the bucket kits, not a bad deal.
We use the bucket harness system like Racer mentioned, and we attache the anchor with the requisite number of nails, and seal them with roof caulk when we pull them. We have a RidgePro, but I think it’s used as a paperweight somewhere. We use the Goat when we’re doing lights, but it wouldn’t be great for washing anything IMO.
You pound nails in every time you get on a roof??are customers ok with that and what happens when the caulk goes bad and the roof leaks 10 years down the road?
Haven’t been doing it for 10 years, but never heard of it happening 1 time yet, and we do well over 100 residential Christmas light installs as well. I mean, we can be safe on your roof and repair the holes, or we can risk falling and our insurance not covering it because we were negligent…then they probably come after you Mr. Homeowner.
You take a pallet and tie a rope to it then stack 10 bags of sand on it. Throw the rope over the roof and tie off to it. Redneck harness system complete.
Another redneck method would be to surround the home with WWE style wrestling rings & just work it into the price. On the side note, be careful up there! Going home is all that really matters at the end of the day. That’s why I stay off of roofs.
That was a link to the boots with pads for shingles. I don’t condone or endorse their metal walking boots. I have worked with them for twenty years with their single boots and have wore a few prototype boots that didn’t make the cut.
You earned your keep on that one. Once you had a path to ridge could have probably blown most of it off with a shooter tip, but a broom works. Nicely done.
