Flat roofing in Breamore

The low roof at the back. Older houses around here grew outwards, so there is usually a single storey outshot, lean to or link with a flat top on it. They are almost always felt: a built up three layer covering with a mineral cap sheet, sometimes over a much older layer that was never stripped. Where the deck is sound we take it back to boards and lay EPDM rubber or a modern torch on system. Where it is not, the boards come off first.

Garages, stores and garden rooms. Detached buildings take the weather from all sides and have no house warming them, so the covering hardens faster and the edges go first. GRP fibreglass suits these well because it is laid wet and forms its own edge trim and upstands in one piece. Single ply, welded at the laps, is the sensible answer where the roof is large.

Deck, falls and insulation. Underneath you find plywood, OSB or chipboard on joists, and chipboard that has been wet does not come back. Firrings create the falls, and a roof laid dead flat holds standing water at every low spot. Where headroom will not allow deeper firrings, tapered insulation does the same work above the deck. A warm roof puts PIR over the boards with a vapour control layer laid under it, so the timber never sits at the dew point. A cold roof leaves the insulation between the joists and has to be ventilated, or condensation forms inside the build up and rots the decking without a drop of rain getting in. BS 6229 is the reference for all of it.

Where they leak. Blisters and bubbles under the membrane, a split or crack where the covering has been walked on, a lifted or failed seam at a lap, and an upstand that was never taken high enough behind a door threshold. Then the trims: the drip over the fascia, the apron into the wall, the kerb round a rooflight, and the outlet itself.

Junctions with old walls. Rubble and soft brick will not take a chase cut with a grinder, so an abutment is better formed with a lead cover flashing tucked into a raked joint or run behind a coping on a parapet. Cavity trays only exist on newer work, so on an older wall the detail has to be thought about rather than copied. Then the rainwater outlet, hopper, gutter and downpipe, sized for what the roof sheds.

No rate per square metre, because the square metres are the easy part and what is under the covering is what decides the job.

Getting to it. A cottage outshot, a detached garage across a yard and a flat link between two tiled roofs are three different problems long before anybody thinks about a membrane. A garage or a single storey extension will often come off a tower, anything above a two storey wall wants a scaffold, and the platform has to stand while the deck is open rather than for an afternoon. The work at height rules are why it is a priced line rather than something folded into a rate.

The deck under the covering. A sound deck can be re-covered. Chipboard that has been wet for years, or ply that gives underfoot, has to come off and be replaced, and you cannot tell which you have from the ground or from a photograph. We lift a corner before quoting, because the deck is the single biggest swing in the price.

The falls, and where the water is meant to go. Most flat roofs that fail were never laid to a fall, or the fall runs at an outlet that has since been blocked or built over. Correcting it with firrings is more work than laying a membrane and it is the difference between a roof that lasts and one that ponds. Upstands, edge trims and each outlet are priced one at a time, because that is where the hours and the leaks both are.

Comparing quotes? Ask which system is being quoted and how many layers, whether the deck is being renewed or covered over, whether the falls are being corrected with firrings, how the upstands, outlets and edge trims are detailed, and whether the scaffold and the skip are in the price. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.

We cover Breamore, Woodgreen, Hale and the SP6 addresses in the Avon valley north of Fordingbridge, with New Forest District Council as the planning authority. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.