I got thinking about roof panels after I mentioned it in the last post. Up here pretty much every roof is a metal roof. You don’t see a lot of shingles here. The roof package was part of our main house package that came up on the sealift.
The roof, as evidenced in the photos, is a fairly steep pitched roof 12/6.5, and this house was built in the dead of winter. Now I hate being up on a metal roof in the cold at the best of times. A little frost or snow and they are SLIPPERY. Never mind being up on a roof this steep. But Gary and Leah’s brother Johnny figured out a system to work off the girts and stay safe. We had some mountaineering gear but basically it was only needed for the last panel on each particular roof. 
I suppose I should explain the composition of the roof. The roof joists are a 16 inch TJI joist, which is basically a manufactured “I” beam. On top of those is 1/2 plywood, followed by poly vapour barrier. Then there is 4 inches of styrofoam insulation (R20). A metal girt is screwed on top of the styrofoam into the plywood and joist. These are set two feet apart, running across the roof. It was these girts that were used as a ladder to work safely on the roof. The final pieces of the roof are another layer of 4 inch styrofoam set in between the girts, a layer of tyvek (a windproof, waterproof, breathable “paper”) and the metal roof panel. These are bolted on to the girts and each other. 
The roof panels are supposed to be the length of the roof, but of course that would actually make the project easier. The way the roof is designed, there are parapet walls on the ends, making the roof either 4 (if the roof buts into a wall) or 8 inches longer than the length of the beam. Unfortunately the roof manufacturer missed that when reviewing the plans, so our panels were all either 4 or 8 inches too short. Fortunately we had extra roofing panels (because some were supposed to go as siding on the wall, which we ended up not doing), but it meant that Gary cut a strip of roof panel for each roof panel on the house. Nothing seemed to come easy on this project
I do have a roof story from the first house I lived in here. Shortly after I moved into the RCMP house I lived in I put in a satellite dish. I was told that the higher it was the better, so it was mounted just at the roof, on the highest corner of the house (The houses here are on pilings, and the house is on a slope). As it wasn’t aimed the bolts were just put on finger tight. About 2 in the morning I woke up to the sound of the dish being slammed against the wall, a gale had sprung up, loosened the bolts and was banging the dish back and forth against the outside of the house. I decided that I really didn’t want to go up on the roof in the dark in this storm and weighed the chances of me still having a dish in the morning instead of a $500 kite. However it stayed on, and at 7, after listening to the dish all night, I went up on the roof. It was October, and I almost, almost, went up without a jacket or anything, as I figured I was going to be up there for five minutes, just long enough to tighten down the dish so it wouldn’t get damaged. But I did grab my stuff and headed up. I scurried across the slippery roof (it’s easier stepping on the bolts) and quickly tightened the dish. Much to my dismay, when I got back to the ladder I found it had been blown over. So here I was at 7 am on a Saturday sitting on my roof, wondering how I was going to get down. Now nothing moves at 7 am on a Saturday so I figured I was going to be a while, but fortunately after about fifteen minutes the housing manager came out of the house that was being built next door and let me down.