Learn How to Make a Simple Roof Shelf for Your Pitched Roof

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If you find that you spend a fair amount of your time working on pitched roofs, you'll know the pains of trying to keep tools and paints in place without them slipping and sliding down the roof plane. Wouldn't it be great if some solution could be found to take away this annoying issue?

Well, it turns out, there is a simple way you can make a roof shelf to make this issue a thing of the past. Follow this simple (and quick) guide to find out how. 

As you can imagine, like any project of this nature, you'll need some tools and materials before you get started. 

Materials and gear needed

• Lumber
• Metal files 
• Screwdriver set
• Double-edged pull saw
• Coping saw
• Various nuts and bolts
• Sandpaper
• Pencil
• Set square and rule

Step 1: Make the basic frame

The first step is to take some scraps of plywood and cut one end to match the topography of the roof. In this case, the roof in question is a corrugated roof. The design of yours will depend entirely on the roof in question. 

With the piece cut out, smooth down the cut surfaces using your metal files. You might want to remove any barbs and splinters of wood that may remain. 

Cut the other end into a convex shape to match the shape of the concave part of the plywood too. Again, file down the cut edges. 

With that complete, cut a small square of hardboard, and drill three lengths of wood to three of its edges. With that complete, mark the center of the lowermost edge to the same dimensions as the bolts you'll be using to make the piece. 

This will form the actual shelf of the piece. The open end is to be closed off using the adjustable "leg" of the roof shelf. 

With that complete, add your main securing bolt to the piece and secure using a nut as needed. Next, take your curved piece of plywood and mark a hole to match the bolt hole near the top of the piece. 

Drill the hole and mount the two pieces of wood together using your bolt. 

With that complete, drill two more holes to either side of the previous hole and add two more bolts to fully secure the two pieces of wood together. 

Step 2: Add adjustment kerfs and complete the piece

Disassemble the piece to remove the main curved piece of wood. With that complete, take a ruler and set square and mark out the positions of the shelf's kerf. To do this, draw a series of parallel lines from the holes down the length of the wood. 

These will be used to form elongated kerfs in the wood to enable the shelf's height to be adjusted with ease. 

With that complete, drill some holes along the lines, and then cut out the strips using your jigsaw or handsaw. 

With that complete, tidy up the cut surfaces using metal files and sandpaper, as needed. Once done, reassemble the roof shelf using bolts, nuts, and washers, as needed.

Alternatively, you could use wing nuts to make fastening and unfastening of the bolts that much easier when in use. 

With that, your DIY roof shelf is now complete. We told you it would be a nice and quick project. You can now put it straight to work on your roof. 

Happy days!

If you work on a variety of roof types, you may want to make a series of supporting pieces to fit different roof shapes and angles. But we'll leave that entirely up to you. 

If you enjoyed this simple DIY project, you may want to test your DIY skills with a more challenging project. How about, for example, your own wooden floating desk?