Making A Corrugated Metal Roof: Part 1

Don't let my killer tan distract you.

Well, my mom's winning.  My plan for this project was always an industrial building in the not-so-great part of a major city.  A few weeks ago, my mom looked at the house and said, "Wow it looks like an old factory building in Western Pennsylvania," to which I responded, "Oh Mom, you're silly."  Since then, every time she visits she asks these things:

1.  Can I have this when you're done?  (No.)
2.  Can you put a quilting room in it?  (No.)
3.  Can you make it more "Western Pennsylvania?"  (No.  Wait, maybe).

Although I hold steadfast on the first 2, it is slowly morphing into an abandoned coal factory building somewhere in a country industrial town.  Case in point: the roof.  What was once going to be a simple "tar" roof (major city style) is now going to be an aged, metal corrugated roof (country style).  Here's how I'm making the roof:

 First I found a Dell box that used corrugated cardboard.  You can probably buy corrugated cardboard without the extra layers; however, I'm very cheap and this was free.


I then peeled off the top layer to expose the corrugation.  This took a while (exactly 3 episodes of Outnumbered) and I had to go groove-by-groove to peel of the paper.  Eventually it looked like this:


And my floor looked like this:

After vacuuming, I took an extra fine grit sandpaper piece and folded it to make an edge.  Then I roughly sanded the cardboard and each groove to get rid of as many extra little papers.

 My sanding resulted in this:
BIG difference, hooray!  At this point, I wasn't worrying about the left over paper pieces because I knew I was going to coat the whole thing in spackle.  
  
The next step was to cut squares out of the cardboard sheet.  I made sure not to make them all the exact same size since it's supposed to look like a roof made of metal sheets.  I glued the pieces to the roof and taped them down so they wouldn't lift too much.

It's spackle time!  I use regular spackling paste that I bought in Home Depot.  The paste is too thick to apply as-is without ruining the grooves of the cardboard, so I mixed it with some water until it was thin enough to coat the paper.  Now let dry overnight.





Comments

  1. I was going to buy sheet for a roof like that for my daughters barn. This would be much cheaper.

    Why do you coat it in spackle? Can you just paint it?? Yes, I should just be patient and watch and learn!

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    Replies
    1. You could definitely just seal then paint it. I spackle it to make it harder so it will survive the aging process which includes multiple coats of paint and stain and sanding. I also didn't want the corrugated bits to lose their shape and I think spackling makes it last longer, although only time will tell. The spackle also changes the texture of the paper and it becomes almost as if you used stone or plaster instead of cardboard. That's a lot of reasons for spackle :)

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  2. Wow... that looks great. I can't wait to see how it turns out.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wat slim om hier karton voor te gebruiken...

    Groeten Xandra

    ReplyDelete
  4. Me gusta tu trabajo, me acabo de hacer seguidora tuya para no perderme nada.

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  5. Hi,

    This is really nice blog.

    Thanks for sharing it...
    Corrugated metal

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  6. Thank you for sharing. I just worked with a Jones Roofing. They did a great job! It looks like you have a great company as well; I will have to recommend you to family and friends in the area.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Metal roof is the best choice for houses that are situated in places which experience heavy snowfall. The metal roof does not allow the snow to settle down on it and it slides down easily.

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  8. What a fun and creative way of making corrugated roofing out of a cardboard box!

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