Yay, It's Time For The Roofing To Go On
After almost a year now into the building project, the time has now come for the roofing to go on. The design of the roof has been sent to a specialised firm who will get the pieces all cut out and ready to be transported to the site and fitted up. At this point, I have planned to be in Accra to first inspect the current building progress and then arrange for payment for the cost of the roofing to the builder, aka Kwame Boadi. My initial plan was to transfer half of the payment for the roofing into Boadi's account, however I hit a snag. From my internet banking interface, I was informed that I can onlyIt is all exciting when you eventually hit a mile stone in any project that you are engaged in. Once the roof goes on, there will be lot of clearing up to do. From the updates Boadi has been sending me, I have noticed that I can only transfer a maximum of GHC10,000.00 into another persons account. Which means I would have to do this over a period of 4 days. Personally that is just inconvenient, not to mention the money the bank will be making off me in bank charges. So the next logical and sensible thing to do was to call Boadi, explain things to him and assure him that I will pay him on my arrival in Accra, which is very soon. One thing I forgot to get confirmation from him on was whether he has called the architect to have the current stage of the project inspected. I have stressed in my previous postings about the importance of getting an agreement in place whereby your architect has your building inspected by his mechanical/structural and electrical engineers. Lets face it, unless you have qualifications in these two disciplines and have the experience, you need someone to confirm that your building, at every stage of its build, is being built properly.
now lets talk a bit about the roofing, specifically the type of roofing that is going to be using on the building. Boadi mentioned in our whatsapp chat that he will be using "Heep Garble". Heep + Garble did not throw much light my why when I did a search on the internet. I then tried the search term "gable" and came up with this"
Gable Roof
Also known as pitched or peaked roof, gable roofs are some of the most popular roofs in the US. They are easily recognized by their triangular shape.
Pros: Gable roofs will easily shed water and snow, provide more space for an attic or vaulted ceilings and allow more ventilation. Their simple design make it easy to build them and cheaper than more complex designs.
Cons: Gable roofs can be problematic in high wind and hurricane areas. If the frames are not properly constructed with adequate supports, the roof can collapse. High winds can also cause materials to peel away from gable roofs. If there is too much of an overhang, winds can create an uplift underneath and cause the roof to detach from the walls.
If a gable roof is used in high wind areas, be sure proper braces are used and have the roof inspected after a large storm to ensure no damage occurred.
Ok so this made more sense, but I still had to find and understand what he also meant by "heep". Further search on Google suggested that Boadi could have been referring to "hip". At this point you are wondering why I did not just go back to Boadi for clarification. Well all this is a learning curve for me. I like to do the research as well and fully understand whatever terminology is being thrown at me. So I did find this definition for 'hip' on Wikipwdia:
A hip roof, hip-roof[1] or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downwards to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope (although a tented roof by definition is a hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak). Thus a hipped roof house has no gables or other vertical sides to the roof.
Hence my logical conclusion for 'heep garble" aka 'hip garble' is that it is a combination of using the constructional elements of both 'hip' and 'garble'.
Pictures and video clip show current stage of building.
Picture and short videos sent to me by: Agbeko Dzamasi
Videos edited using DaVinci Resolve Studio
