TOPIC: A bit of venting

I did a home inspection last week in the Kitchener area that revealed a bit of a surprise.    The home was a more expensive home and looked well maintained.  The roof had recently been re-shingled.  The shingling job looked nice;  straight rows, no buckles. The seller had the documents from the roofing contractor to show the date of installation and warranties etc.  You can't hold it against me that I expected to find the roof in tip top shape.  As it turned out, most of the issues with this house were directly related to the roofing  I will illustrate the most glaring one.

The roof vents were ridge vents.  Ridge vents have an advantage over the very common square roof vents because they are continuous and they are at the very top of the roof where the hot attic air most likely want to escape.

I usually inspect the attic last so I don’t have to do any more inspecting once I have collected dust and insulation on my clothes.
Once I was in the attic I checked to make sure that the plywood was cut back far enough at the ridge to allow for adequate air flow.  Well…The photograph below shows what I found.  This is looking straight up into the peak of the roof.
There was no opening at all.  The ridge cap was sitting on the roof looking good but it sure wasn’t doing any good. It was a good thing that the roof was new so the heat and moisture didn’t have a chance yet to damage the framing, the plywood or to the shingles.
There is no way that this was a mistake.  This was a deliberate shortcut.  Any roofing contractor knows that a roof vent can’t vent the roof if there is no way the attic air can get to the vent.  It simply was much quicker to install an ineffective vent, collect the money and run than to do the job properly.
My recommendation:  Don’t assume the job has been done right.  Get a professional home inspector to check it out.  It may be the best money you have spent in a while.

Ummm, nice vent cut---NOT

Oh, how was the framing secured to ridge board cause I don't see anything?
(disclaimer- I am older and have a cataract forming in rt eye. wear tri-focals too)

The rafters were end nailed through the ridge board.  I will attach another picture that shows the nails.  On this picture there appears to be a gap for venting.  Just appearances.  The black you see isn't the inside of the vent but the underside of shingles. 

My first question would be is there any other vents in the attic ? I would also look a lil closed at everything after seeing the size of the ridge beam, it should be larger than the rafters !! not much can be done about it now but just cause for a closer look. The roofer charged X $ for the ridge venting which should have included cutting back the sheeting so he saved a few bucks or his men just were lazy either way it is not rite !

There were other vents in the roof.  Every 4th joist space had a soffit Mor-vent installed.  There was a side attic that was totally closed of at the top.  All it would have needed was baffles installed on top of the wall to connect it to the upper attic.  Not that it would have done any good seeing that it didn't have any venting up there anyways.  Incredibly hot up there at 6 PM.
You're right about the $$.  I have no idea of course if the contractor skimped or if the workers are going to get fired for being lazy.
Again you're right about the size of the ridge board.  A small section of the roof had bigger rafters on the one side than the rest of the roof.  I missed that.  Thanks.  There was another framing concern as well.

Ummm, nice vent cut---NOT

Oh, how was the framing secured to ridge board cause I don't see anything?
(disclaimer- I am older and have a cataract forming in rt eye. wear tri-focals too)

GLUE!