"Brett Philp" wrote in message
m...
I live in Ontario Canada and I'm considering replacing my
1700 sqft
asphalt roof with either Steel or Aluminum metal roof.
I've spoken to
Classic Products ($15k cdn) as well as Hy-Grade ($10k cdn)
and they
both seem like good products.

I've heard that Steel can loose it's finish. Anyone with
any
experience with either Steel or Aluminium that can comment
on the
value would be greatly appreciated!

Also I'm told the standard is to install straight over my
existing
roof... any thoughts on that? What about mold, fire,
weight, sound
and home heating?

Also anyone experienced with either company I'd love to
hear your
thoughts!

Thanks,

Don't know either company, but put a new roof on about two
years ago, and did consider metal roofing. I like the look
of it, sound of it, and the way snow slides off it so easily
(we're in NY). Maybe this'll at least give you a couple
questions for the contractors.
Two of five contractors however recommended against it
for warranty reasons: too expensive to do repairs if/when
they happened. A third reminded me, in making our decision,
of all the work he got a few years back when we got one of
those golf ball sized hail storms - couple years later he
siad he had lots of painting jobs from it, and almost no
complaints from "regular" roof customers.
They all agreed they could put it over what's there now,
AFTER it was inspected for (forget what they called it) the
underlayment being solid and no rot or dryrot. If there was
any, they would still have to remove/replace those sections
before the roof could go on. And then of course they had to
be sure the roof line stayed straight. Turned out they
didn't literally lay the metal right on the shbingles but
used a sub-frame to put it on.
My insurance agent though, had the best reasons for us
(not necessarily you) to NOT have a metal roof: Metal was
MUCH harder to punch through to get into the house for fire
fighting and supposedly most fire departments hated them for
that reason. Even when a fire was cold, they can't,
apparently, be sure without first letting it cool, and then
going inside and ripping the roof off from the inside to
expose any remaining embers. When I heard that, I called
the fire dept and they agreed, surprisingly. I thbought it
was bunk, to tell you the truth, but that was two sources
that should have been reliable. Now, we do have a volunteer
fire dept, so an urban dept might not care what a roof is -
they have much better and bigger equipment and more money, I
suppose.

Anyway, that's my two cents - I'd suggest con sider it more
food for thought than solid advice of any kind, but it's
things you can check on.

Regards,

Pop