Aluminum Flashing showing thru shingles on Bay Window roof

Hi,

I just had a new roof installed. I also got the bay window roof done by the same roofers.  The main roof seems fine. They did a good job on it.  

When they were doing the bay roof, I heard a lot of cursing. After they were done with it, I asked if there was any problem with the bay window, and the foreman said no, everything was great. But the workman who did it told me that the bricks (brick siding on my house) were half an inch off on one side of the window, whatever that means.

I inspected it, and saw some silver patches on the right side of the roof near the top, asked what it was, the guy said it was just some aluminum, and he put some brown caulking over it, and assured me the roof was 100 percent perfect, don’t worry about a thing, etc.

But a few days later I noticed the same sort of silver spots on the left side of the roof. Maybe I hadn’t noticed them before due to how the sun was reflecting.

In the attached pic, you can see them right under the top left diagonal molding, near the bottom left edge of the molding. Two short oblong patches about 6 iches long and an inch wide, running at a 45 degree angle.

Upon looking closely at it, it turns out that the shingles there are not flush with the molding, and are drooping down somehow, exposing the aluminum behind and under(?) them.

My neighbors got their bay windows done also, and they don’t have the aluminum showing through.

I paid $400 per square for this job, a simple hip roof, plus the bay, so I think I should not have aluminum showing through the roof.

Sort of looks like the plywood on the left side is too low, and doesn’t meet flush with the molding. Or it has warped inward in the middle.

What will the roofers have to do to make this bay roof look right?

What did they do wrong, if anything, to have it turn out this way?

I’m not anti-roofer. They are hardworking guys, but this aluminum shouldn’t be showing through, right?

Thanks for any advice ! :slight_smile:

p7xn.jpg in image shack

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can’t upload images yet to roofing site.

Can’t get to your pic but something sounds fishy!

Added the pic to my album. [Gandalf][1/]

It’s the first and only image in the album.

It looks like the step flashing was improperly done.

The step flashing is not supposed to show. That is why it’s not painted.

Before the painted flashing that is left exposed is installed, base flashing is installed first.

There are a couple different kinds of base flashing. In your case its step flashing pieces.

There should be one piece of step flashing for each shingle. Most likely they re-used the existing step flashing instead of installing new.

When the foreman got around to the bay window and saw what the other guy did. ( Leaving the step flashing exposed ) that was probably the cursing you heard. :lol:

Thanks. How can they fix it? How long will it take? Suppose they suggest painting the exposed flashing brown, like the roof. Will that be just as good from a structural point of view, as redoing that portion of the roof? I haven’t paid them anything yet.

Could you take a pic from the left side of the bay window before I comment on that?

There is some speculation on my part about it being the step flashing because I can’t see the metal “strips” you mention very well.

I have seen roofers re-use existing step flashing and leave the bottom part exposed many times so I based the above reply more on past experiences than an actual visual.

I would have, and do those bay windows differently. I will step flash them just for technical purposes (1 step for every shingle) but I would also put the wall flash over the shingles and step flashing. The water on those two side pieces is going to flow away from the house. The way I see it (on the side pieces) water will run down your brick wall, onto the wall flashing and under the shingles.

I added three more pics to the album. It’s as close as I can get to the area, using my step ladder. Take a look at Bay5 and Bay6. In Bay5 you see the left side with the 2 aluminum areas showing. In Bay6 you see the right side, with one aluminum area showing.

I live in a townhome community of about 30 townhomes, so I was able to walk around and see how the other bay roofs were redone when they got new roofs, by different contractors. Most of them don’t have any aluminum showing through, but there were 5 bay roofs with plenty of aluminum showing between the top of the shingles and the molding above them, some of them on one side only, and two of them had about 2 inches of aluminum showing left, right, and center. I even saw one with the individual flashing per shingle exposed.

At least I don’t have it as bad as some of the other folks!

On my bay roof situation, the exposed aluminum you see is overhung by a lip on the bottom of the molding, so if the rain water were to drip straight down off that lip, it would land on top of shingles, and get carried away.

I just noticed my immediate neighbor has one shingle “collapsing” and exposing the aluminum under it, right under the molding.

I wonder if there will be more and more aluminum exposed as time goes by and the shingles settle in.

I want to know my options before I mention this to the roofing co. Pretty sure they will say it’s "normal"and no leaks will occur, don’t worry about it, and I’ll have to insist they do something anyway, and it will be up to me to force them to do the right thing, unfortunately. I just need to know what the right thing is.

Thanks

The first pic you added to your album was large but didn’t show the exposed metal very well.

The rest of them ended up small and I can not enlarge them without too much blur.

Huh… When I go into the gallery and click on each pic individually, they get expanded to larger than full screen, and they look pretty clear, on my computer.

I don’t really see what the issue is. It looks to be properly done except they used galvanized tin flashings instead of a color matching brown which may be what your neighbors had done. This is purely cosmetic.

At least you aren’t seeing the brick.

OK, Gandolf. I know what you are seeing now.

You are seeing the base flashing that I spoke of except the step flashings are not left exposed down on the roof like I thought they might be.

Instead the base flashing ( whatever type it is ) is left exposed in about 3 places. 2 on the left side and one on the right.

Have them bring out a can of dark brown spray paint and paint ALL of the exposed flashing.

As long as it isn’t leaking that’s all thats required to solve the issue.

The base flashing should have been painted an inch up the wall and an inch onto the roof before the exposed flashing was installed. That way even though some of the base flashing ended up showing, it would not have been so obvious because it would have been the same brown color as all the rest of the flashing and not silver and sticking out like a sore thumb.

Not a very pretty job. It’s probably watertight though.

You too? :smiley:

Wow, If my guys did that. It would be there last job. Not the best work I have ever seen.

Nope, it isn’t leaking into the house. Already been through some big rain. I’m relieved to know it is probably watertight and just could use some paint!

Thanks for the responses.