Repairing a Split Wooden Shake or Shingle

• 1). Cut a metal shim to fit under the split in the damaged shake or shingle. Use a pair of regular household tin snips to cut your shim from a piece of sheet metal flashing. Make the shim about 2½ inches wide, and long enough so that it will extend about one inch beyond the exposed portion of the damaged shake or shingle.
  
  
• 2). Bend the bottom corners of the shim at about 45-degree angles. This will help the shim stay in place once it's been positioned underneath your split shingle.
  
  
• 3). Slide the shim underneath the split in the shingle. Line the split up with the center of your shim and push that metal piece all the way up so that the end of it, with the bent corners, is resting about flush with the butt end of the damaged shake or shingle. The metal shim restores the split shingle's water-resisting properties.
  
  

Removing a Replacing a Badly Damaged Wooden Shake or Shingle

• 1). Pry the damaged shingle up to expose the nails holding it in place, using a pry bar. Don't be too rough with it; you don't want to damage any of the other shingles around your bad piece of material.
  
  
• 2). Pull the nails holding the shingle in place, using a specialized tool called a slater's ripper. If you can't manage to pull the nails, use a hacksaw blade saw or a reciprocal saw to cut the nail shafts and free the shingle.
  
  
• 3). Pull the damaged shingle off the roof and toss it in the garbage. Fit a new piece of material in the vacated slot. Leave the base of this new shake or shingle about one inch lower than the butt ends of the rest of the shingles in the course.
  
  
• 4). Hammer the new piece in place with two corrosion-resistant roofing nails. Drive each nail about ¾ inch from each of the shingle edges, and as close to the bases of the shingles or shakes above as possible. Drive the nails at about 45-degree angles up toward the roof's peak.
  
  
• 5). Hammer to knock the shingle up into position with a wood block, so that the shingle's butt is flush with the butts of the other shingles or shakes in the course. If you've done it properly, the nail heads should now be lying underneath the shingles above and out of sight.