Agape Builders

03/22/2015

Here is a concrete entrance ramp that we recently built for a nail salon in Pensacola. It is complete with an enclosed drain in the concrete for the gutter and planter areas between the ramps and the building.

03/22/2015

03/22/2015

I cannot seem to find the best pictures, but here are some before and after pictures of a project I did for some clients living on Pensacola Bay where we removed the old rotten front staircase, installed new French drains and other storm water drains around the front driveway and around the sides of the house draining out to the bay underground, extensive landscaping, the area's largest residential whole home water purification system, exposed aggregate concrete work, and a new front staircase with recessed lighting with hidden low voltage wiring, and railings on the front porch to match.

03/22/2015

This was a 6,000 square foot commercial warehouse that we built out on the interior with offices, garage and storage spaces, computer server rooms, a break / dining room, and a custom "safe" evidence storage room for a sheriff's department. We were the general contractor on the job and provided everything from framing to electrical, HVAC, drywall, doors, trim, accoustical drop ceilings, carpeting, et cetera.

Give us a call at (850) 377-6073 if we can help you with your next construction project!

03/20/2015

Any good re-roofing job starts with stripping the old roof down to the roof decking and inspecting for defects or insufficiencies of any sort that can endanger your family, home, or possessions during a windstorm event.

Several common roof defects that you quite often see are shown here on the pictures from this job. First of all, there is quite a few areas where leaks from the prior roof has caused the plywood decking and even some roof framing to suffer from wood rot. That MUST be fixed before even thinking of reroofing the structure.

All roofs need to be inspected to see if the decking has been nailed off to current building codes at a minimum. This roof deck had several pieces of loose decking where the plywood was not even nailed off at all and was basically held down only by gravity. That does not do well in a hurricane.

There was extensive delamination of almost every piece of plywood on the roof. This weakens the plywood and must be replaced according to building code. Or, as we did with this home, you can alternatively cover the entire roof structure with another layer of roof decking. Since so many sheets of plywood experienced delamination issues without so much wood rot, the rotten areas were cut out and replaced and the entire deck got a new layer of 1/2" exterior plywood and was renailed off according to code with 12d ring shank galvanized nails. That provided a rock solid deck for us to roof over that will be virtually impossible for any hurricane to blow off. If that roof ever comes off in a storm, we have bigger problems to worry about because everything else around it will be flattened to the ground first.

In almost all cases where an insurance claim is filed, the insurance will also pay to replace the decking and renail off the roof as needed.

Do you need a new roof or a repair? Give us a call today at 377-6073!

03/20/2015

We are both licensed and experienced (35 years) for nearly every type of building construction, both new and also repairs and remodeling for both residential and commercial jobs. This was a major repair and remodeling job on a three story condo on Navarre Beach that had extensive problems with wood rot caused by missing and improperly installed flashing from the original construction. Now, it will never rot again and the homeowners are enjoying a new living room upstairs.

03/20/2015

Believe it or not, this roof got us a half page photo spread plus a feature article in the Pensacola News Journal. It was a story about how to update and reinforce homes to resist damage from the hurricanes and other storms that we have here in Florida. The existing plywood decking had all delaminated and we installed new plywood decking over the entire roof deck as well as re-nailed off the whole roof with larger 12d galvanized ring shank nails.

Please see the individual photos and captions to see the details shown of the sort of work that we do and the reasons for it.

03/18/2015

It is nice if everything on a job goes nice and easy and there are no hidden problems, but that is often not the case in construction. You must be prepared for almost anything when doing repair or remodeling work as opposed to working on your own new construction projects.

On this re-roofing project, we ran into all sorts of problems caused primarily by poor construction techniques and application on the original work. Poorly applied and missing flashing along with other poor construction led to extensive hidden wood rot issues with both decking and framing members. There was not a straight line with any of the framing members, so we had to straighten what we could and find ways to straighten the roofing to cover up the crooked roof underneath. All things considered, I think that we ended up with a satisfactory result that far exceeded the quality of the original construction and solved the issues that the homeowner had previously dealt with.

03/18/2015

One method of applying roofing to low sloped roofs such as this carport and another porch shed type roof (attached to a house that we also re-roofed) is the commercial type roofing method of applying a fiberglass based sheet with a rubberized cap sheet applied with a cold process mopped adhesive.

After the old roofing is removed and the underlying decking is properly prepared to accept the new roofing, a strong fiberglass base sheet is securely fastened to the deck with metal cap nails such as Simplex nails. Then, cold process asphalt adhesive compound is brushed onto the entire surface before a rubberized cap sheet is applied to the top and rolled with a heavy metal roller to make sure it is thoroughly adhered to the base sheet. I also nail around the edges and reseal all of those nails to ensure that the sheets are never able to be lifted in high wind events.

On this job, the rolled cap sheet roofing was factory color matched to the shingles that we were using on the rest of the roof that had a steeper pitch.

03/18/2015

Here is one of many docks / piers that we have built over the years. This particular one is located on Perdido Bay in West Pensacola near the Alabama state line. The tall pilings (on the left side of the the pier) for a future boathouse or lift were already installed previously, but we installed the rest of them and built the pier itself.