Driving through western VA and TN in November, my husband and I noticed many farmhouses with tires placed on top of porch roofs (may have also been on top of the house, but we couldn't see up there). Any ideas what they were for?!

-- Lynne David (lynnedavid@msn.com), February 23, 2001

Answers

People in Texas put the tires on the roof to help hold them down when the severe thunderstorms blow through. It does help, especially on mobile homes. When one piece of the metal roofing blows loose, it pulls the one beside it off, and so on down the line. If the metal can not come completely loose in the first place, it won't peel of any others.

-- (ratdogs10@yahoo.com), February 23, 2001.

Better than goats on the roof!! My two cashmere goats broke out of their stall, went trough chicken wire in the chicken house, out the closed chickens door into the hens yard pulled the chicken wire roof down jumped on it and onto the roof. I was doing dishes and there they were out the window. Needless to say does anyone want two 8 month old cashmere doelings cheap?!?! cara lewis

-- cara lewis (cnllewis@email.com), February 23, 2001.

Yeah, I agree that they were probably there to hold down the tin. I'm in Texas and we do get some nasty winds during thunderstorms, usually as the storm's blowing in, right before the big rain hits. It's really horrible when the tin flies and all you can do is sit there and watch it rain in and ruin all your stuff. I'M not going out there to dodge more flying tin that might decapitate me just to climb up on top of a barn where I'm sure to be lightning bait and I'm not letting hubby, either! LOL!

-- Wingnut (wingnut@moment.net), February 23, 2001.

Several years ago when I owned an electrical contracting company I was approached by a lady wonderin the same thing. The reason she gave was to keep lightning from strikin the mobile home. Still to this day I suppose she believes it to be true. I agreed with'r! It is , of course, to keep the roof from blowing off. Matt.24:44

-- hoot (hoot@pcinetwork.com), February 23, 2001.

I hope they used whitewalls, in order to make their homes attractive!

Maybe they were also using them to attract mosquitoes.

In Peru and Bolvia, I saw a lot of buildings which used bowling ball sized rocks to keep the roof in place. I don't know if they were trying to save money by not buying nails (which were not used), or if it was because, without nails, there were no holes in the roof, effectively preventing a lot of potential leaks. Perhaps the tires perform the same function. Maybe the folks where you saw the tires couldn't find any rocks?? I know that, where I grew up, in east Texas, there were no rocks to be found within a few hundred miles, unless you count the chalk rock found five or six feet underground.

JOJ

-- jumpoffjoe (jumpoff@ecoweb.net), February 23, 2001.

We put tires on the roof of a mobile home to reduce the creaking and popping from the wind until we could build a roofover on it.

-- Jay Blair in N. AL (jayblair678@yahoo.com), February 23, 2001.

I once visited a pen pal in Las Vegas. Noticed rocks ranging from walnut-size to about the size of a baby's head on roofs in his neighborhood. He said it had something to do with absorbing heat so it didn't come through the roof. Beyond me.

-- Ken S. in WC TN (scharabo@aol.com), February 23, 2001.