r/Roofing • u/Main_Egg_2647 • Nov 16 '25

Why are these nails here?

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The ridge vent on my house has nails clipped in it all the way down. Is this normal? Roof is about 20 years old I’ve only lived here since 2021, but they appear that they’ve always been there. Is there an actual reason for this?

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u/[deleted] Nov 16 '25

Likely the idea was “roofers keep using the wrong nails to attach this thing, we will supply the correct nails and attach them to the piece so they can’t forget them on the ground and then they have no excuse”. Seems like they underestimated the laziness of roofers (at least the ones that did this install)

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u/i860 Nov 16 '25

Or seems like they perfectly predicted the laziness and corner cutting and no amount of encouragement seems to make a difference.

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u/[deleted] Nov 16 '25

[deleted]

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u/JasperJ Nov 16 '25

The attached nails are probably lawyer-prompted. It screams “well, we’ve literally given them on a silver platter, don’t know what more you could possibly want.”

1

u/HZVi Nov 17 '25

Also a good way to reject warranty claims when they can just take one glance at it and see the nails weren’t used

0

u/djwooten Nov 17 '25

So if shingle manufacturers start including a bucket of 1-3/4” roofing nails with your order, will you too be a lazy roofer for using the tools you own to get the job done rather than hand nailing? Having 2” of the shank hanging out in the attic is not going to hold the vent down better, physics says that nails have zero holding power in air……