Tear-Off and Dry-In the Same Day

Purpose

This procedure guarantees that no part of the deck is left open past the crew's ability to cover it, and that everything stripped today is watertight before the weather cutoff today. Without it a crew strips to its own appetite, which is always faster than it dries in, and the shop ends up owning an interior: wet insulation, stained drywall, a hardwood floor, and a claim that costs several times the roof.

The number this SOP protects is not the day's square count. It is the gap between the strip line and the dry-in line, which is the only part of the roof that can hurt anybody.

Scope

Covers single-family and small multi-family asphalt and metal reroofs where tear-off and dry-in happen in one work day. Covers the strip sequence, deck inspection and replacement, underlayment and ice barrier, drip edge order, and the end-of-day water cutoff at an unfinished line.

Does not cover the finished shingle or panel installation above the underlayment, owned by the asphalt shingle replacement and standing-seam metal SOPs. Does not cover low-slope membrane tear-off, where a partial-day tie-in is a hot-work or adhesive detail rather than a lap. Does not cover ladder, anchor or clearance setup, which run first.

Roles and responsibilities

The open-deck rule

Open deck is stripped area not yet covered by underlayment. The cap is the amount the on-site dry-in crew can cover in 60 minutes, so it is a capacity number, not a habit. A two-person crew rolling synthetic underlayment with cap fasteners covers on the order of 5 squares an hour on a walkable slope, so the default cap is 5 squares - measure your own crew once on a clean roof and use your number.

The cap exists because weather does not give notice, and because the crew that gets caught is always the crew whose dry-in pair got pulled onto something else. That is exactly what deck repair does. When any two people leave the dry-in line, the gap grows at the full strip rate with nothing behind it.

Procedure

1. Set the weather cutoff and the strip target at the huddle, out loud, before anything comes off. Pull the hourly forecast, find the earliest hour with a meaningful chance of precipitation or a wind rise, and set the cutoff at least one hour ahead of it. Then set the day's strip target as what can be stripped, dried in, and flashed inside that window. Acceptance: a cutoff time and a square target, both spoken and both written on the ticket. Wrong looks like a target set from the crew's usual day. Stop rule: no reliable forecast for the address means the target drops to what can be dried in within two hours. Hazard: wind is the roofer's cutoff, not rain - stop roof work at sustained wind above roughly 25 mph or gusts over 35 unless your shop sets a tighter number, because loose underlayment and sheet goods become sails.

2. Protect the ground, the envelope and the occupants before the first bundle drops. Tarp the walls and plantings, set plywood over window wells and AC condensers, place the dumpster on protection, and tell the occupants which doors are closed for the day. Acceptance: no unprotected glass, mechanical unit or walkway under any drop zone, and a spoken agreement with the occupant. Wrong looks like a tarp laid over a shrub instead of framed above it, which crushes it anyway. Stop rule: an occupant who will not keep pets or children out of the drop zone means the drop zone moves or the day does not start. Hazard: falling debris and nails are the customer-side injury on this job, so the drop zone is barricaded, not just announced - and the tech's duty to a homeowner standing in their own yard is ordinary care, not an OSHA duty.

3. Confirm access and fall protection are complete and verified. The ladder is set and secured to the roof access standard, the anchor is in framing, and each worker's clearance was calculated for the connector they are wearing. Acceptance: the fall protection setup entry on the ticket is filled in, including the verifier's name. Wrong looks like an anchor set into the old shingle layer that nobody probed. Stop rule: nothing is stripped until that entry is complete. Hazard: on a tear-off the anchor is installed through the layers you are about to remove, so re-verify it into the exposed deck once the surrounding area is stripped, because its substrate has just changed.

4. Strip in bounded sections and never past the open-deck cap. Work a section from ridge down, keep the strip line straight and parallel to the eave, and have someone read the gap between the strip line and the dry-in line every half hour. Acceptance: the gap stays at or under the cap set in the open-deck section, measured in squares. Wrong looks like a crew that has stripped a whole slope because it was easier than moving twice. Stop rule: the gap exceeds the cap and the strip crew stops where they stand and joins the dry-in line until the gap closes. Hazard: exposed deck with old nails standing proud is the trip surface, so nails are pulled or driven flush inside the section before anyone walks it, not at the end of the day.

5. Inspect the deck as it is exposed, and price the repair before it is covered. Sound each exposed sheet, look for delamination, water staining, sagging between rafters and any soft spot at a valley or penetration. Acceptance: every replaced sheet lands on rafter centers, is fastened to the schedule, and is photographed with a tape in frame before underlayment goes over it. Wrong looks like a soft sheet covered because the crew did not want to stop. Stop rule: a replacement count above the contract's included allowance goes to the customer as a written change at the per-sheet rate in the contract, approved before it is buried. Hazard: cutting sheathing releases wood dust and whatever was on the old felt, so cut with dust control and eye protection, and if you meet friable insulation or a suspect board product you did not expect, stop and get it identified rather than cutting through it.

6. Dry in behind the strip line in the correct order. At the eave the drip edge goes on first and the underlayment or ice barrier laps over it; at the rake the underlayment goes down first and the drip edge over it. Where your jurisdiction's adopted edition of the IRC calls for an ice barrier, it runs from the eave edge to at least 24 in inside the exterior wall line, which on a low slope or a deep overhang means more than one course. Use felt meeting ASTM D226 or D4869, or a self-adhered ice barrier meeting ASTM D1970, in whichever of those the adopted code and the shingle manufacturer both accept. Acceptance: correct order at both edges, laps at the manufacturer's stated overlap, cap fasteners at the stated pattern, no fishmouths. Wrong looks like drip edge installed over the eave underlayment, which sends water behind the fascia. Stop rule: an ice barrier that does not reach 24 in past the wall line is re-run before shingles go over it. Hazard: staples in synthetic underlayment tear out under wind and leave the crew standing on a sheet that is no longer attached.

7. Flash the penetrations and valleys inside the same window. Every pipe boot, chimney, skylight and valley in the dried-in area gets its underlayment detail before the cutoff, not tomorrow. Acceptance: no open penetration and no unlapped valley anywhere in the dried-in area at the cutoff time. Wrong looks like a chimney left with underlayment cut short and no counter detail because the crew ran late. Stop rule: if the flashing cannot be finished, that section is temporarily sealed and the strip line is pulled back rather than left open. Hazard: a penetration is where crews step on their own membrane, so keep boots off the freshly laid course around a pipe and work outward.

8. Cut the water off at the strip line and sweep the ground before the crew leaves. Where the day ends mid-slope, run the underlayment up-slope past the strip line and terminate it under an existing course or over the ridge, then seal and fasten the top edge so water cannot get behind it. Acceptance: no exposed horizontal top edge anywhere, and two magnet passes over every drop zone and driveway. Wrong looks like a top edge simply nailed down flat on old shingles, which is a funnel. Stop rule: a tie-in that cannot be lapped under an existing course gets a full-width cover strip, not a bead of sealant. Hazard: the last hour is when tired people carry loads on a ladder - hoist by rope, and the last person down still comes down empty-handed.

The record this produces

One tear-off day entry on the job ticket: date, address, weather cutoff set and the reason for it, strip target and actual, dried-in square count at close, sheets of decking replaced with location and photographs, whether the change order was signed and by whom, the highest open-deck gap reached during the day, any stop rule that fired, and where the strip line ended with the tie-in method used.

The lead writes it at close. The next morning's crew reads the tie-in line first, because it says where to start and what to undo. The estimator reads the deck-replacement count. The office reads the whole thing if a leak is reported that night.

Worked pass: 20-square walkable reroof, five-person crew

Cutoff set at 3:00 pm against a front forecast for 4:00. Strip crew of three runs about 4 squares an hour; dry-in pair runs about 5. Open-deck cap 5 squares. Target 20 squares stripped and dried in.

At 9:30 the strip crew exposed five delaminated sheets over the north valley. Step 5 sends the dry-in pair to replace them, which takes an hour. Stripping continues at 4 squares an hour with nothing behind it.

Step 4 fails at 10:30: the gap reads 6.0 squares against a 5.0 cap. The stop rule fires and the strip crew comes off the line. All five dry in for forty minutes, closing the gap to zero by 11:10, then the normal split resumes. Strip completes at 1:10 pm instead of the planned 12:30, dry-in at 1:25 instead of 1:00. Flashing, drip edge and the ground sweep run to 2:40, leaving 20 minutes of margin against the 3:00 cutoff rather than the 45 minutes planned.

The honest read on the ticket is that the day was recovered, not comfortable. The lead's note says the strip target should have dropped by three squares the moment the deck repair was called: at 4 squares an hour that is 45 minutes of strip time returned, against the 25 minutes of margin the day actually lost. The five sheets were photographed with a tape in frame before the underlayment went over them, and the change was signed at 11:30 at the contract's per-sheet rate.

References

• International Residential Code, in the edition your jurisdiction has adopted, for underlayment, ice barrier extent and drip edge requirements on asphalt shingle roofs
• ASTM D226 and ASTM D4869 for asphalt-saturated felt underlayment, and ASTM D1970 for self-adhered ice barrier membrane
• The shingle and underlayment manufacturer's installation instructions, which govern fastener type, pattern and lap and are the condition of the material warranty
• See related: the fall protection setup SOP and the ladder setup and roof access standard, both of which run before step 4