Understanding Roof Pitch

You ll often hear experts express pitch as x over y.

Understanding roof pitch.

To calculate pitch you simply divide rise by span and display your result as a fraction. Because it is one of the many key elements that determine the safety of the roof over your head there is a very good reason to understand the purpose of roof pitch. Roof pitch is the rise of the roof over the run of the roof. They do not mean the same thing.

This implies a rooftop that is 4 inches higher than it was 12 creeps back assessing on a flat plane is a four and twelve rooftop. For example given a roof with a rise of 4 feet and a span of 24 feet the pitch is 1 to 6 pitch which can be expressed as the fraction of 1 6. How to measure roof pitch. Mathematically the pitch of a roof is different calculation than roof slope.

Simply put roof pitch is the measurement of the angle or the steepness of your roof. For example if a roof is 8 feet high and spreads out from the center covering 12 feet in each direction the rise over the run would be 8 12. Pitch compares the roof s span to the rise while slope compares rise and run. The rise is the height of the roof from the base to the top.

The angle or pitch of a roof is calculated by the number of inches it rises vertically for every 12 inches it extends horizontally. A 12 to 24 pitch is expressed as 1 2. A roof that ascents six inches each twelve level inches is depicted as a 6 and 12 roof. For example a roof that rises 6 inches for every 12 inches of horizontal run has a 6 in 12 pitch.