Kittatinny Roofing

Roofing contractors in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

Bethlehem holds two centuries of building in a small compass, and the north side is where the post-war city expanded onto open ground with the steel plant still running.

What Bethlehem roofs are dealing with

The neighborhoods north of Union Boulevard went up quickly through the fifties and sixties for families working at the plant. Ranches and split-levels, shallow pitches, modest overhangs, and attics that were insulated long after they were built. Most are on a second covering now, and the ventilation was rarely revisited when the insulation went in.

That combination is what produces ice at the eaves here. Warm air reaches the deck, snow melts from underneath, the water runs to the cold overhang and stops. It is not the covering that fails first in that scenario; it is the edge detail and whatever is under it.

North of Union Boulevard the city expanded quickly through the fifties and sixties for families working at the plant: ranches and split-levels, shallow pitches, modest overhangs, and attics insulated decades after they were built without the ventilation being revisited.

Slate does not age the way asphalt does. The roof age check puts each part of the envelope on its own clock.

Covering Hanover Township, Westgate, Butztown, Santee Mill, Monocacy and the rest of Bethlehem.

Slate does not fail the way shingle fails. On old housing it gives out where two centuries meet. Which is why the useful question is not what the covering looks like, but what it runs into.
Garage Point 1: the ridge 1 Point 2: the field of the covering 2 Point 3: the valleys 3 Point 4: flashing at a shared wall 4 Point 5: a penetration 5 Point 6: the overhang 6
  1. 1 The ridge. The highest course, and on slate the one most often reset by hand.
  2. 2 The field. Quarry slate on the old houses, asphalt on everything since. Two very different clocks.
  3. 3 Valleys. Where leaf litter settles, and where a slate roof usually ends its life.
  4. 4 Wall flashing. The party wall of a row or twin, rising through a roof two houses share.
  5. 5 Penetrations. Holes cut on purpose. When access is awkward they get sealed instead of rebuilt.
  6. 6 The overhang. Where meltwater from a warm attic reaches cold framing and stops.

When the work happens in Bethlehem

The north side follows the county rhythm, with the usual autumn compression. Because so much of this housing went up in the same decade, neighborhoods tend to reach replacement together, and the local queue can form faster than the calendar suggests.

What moves the price in Bethlehem

Ice at the eaves is the driver here, and it is not fixed by the covering. A membrane that runs well past the wall line, intake at the soffit that insulation has not blocked, and exhaust sized to match: those three together are the work, and a quote that mentions none of them is quoting a symptom.

Three questions decide the price here more than any product choice does. The comparison checklist will tell you which estimate has looked properly:

  • If it is slate, is it being repaired, replaced in kind, or changed for something else, and does the framing carry the difference?
  • What does the decking work out to per sheet, and on what assumption?
  • Is the flashing new?

The work

Before you call anyone in Bethlehem

Between the ridge and the river the same three questions keep arriving. Rather than answer them town by town, the guides take them properly:

Why roofs fail here

Six ways a roof gives out around here, one page each, and the slate ones behave nothing like the rest.

Nearby

All areas covered