Flat roofing in Fordingbridge

The flat bit between two pitched roofs. Fordingbridge has a lot of older housing with something added on the back, and that produces the awkward roof: a flat section running between two pitches, a rear addition, a dormer with a flat top, or a porch.

These are the roofs that leak first, because water from both slopes ends up on a small area with one outlet. Coverings in Fordingbridge are usually torch on felt, three layer built up felt with a mineral surfaced cap sheet, or GRP fibreglass laid over a deck that was already tired. We strip a bay, look at the plywood, OSB or chipboard underneath, and price from what is actually there. Sound boards get a new covering. Wet chipboard decking comes off and new boards are fixed to the joists first.

Choosing the covering. EPDM rubber goes on in a single sheet, which suits a plain rectangle and does not care about a cold day. GRP fibreglass gives a hard surface that copes with foot traffic and trims neatly around a complicated shape, but it wants a dry deck and a mild spell to cure. Torch on felt is still the right answer on plenty of roofs, especially where it has to lap into existing detail. Single ply earns its place on a long clear run. We say which one suits your roof and why it is on the quote.

Falls, outlets and the details. Ponding is a warning, not a quirk. Standing water works into every lap and seam and freezes them apart. The cause is usually no fall at all, firrings cut shallow, or an outlet blocked with silt. We rebuild the falls with firrings or tapered insulation so it runs to a rainwater outlet, following BS 6229:2025 on flat roofs, and check the gutter, hopper and downpipe below. The leaks themselves are almost always at the edge trim, the drip, the apron, the kerb round an opening or a lap: felt blisters, bubbles and splits, single ply lifts at a failed seam, fibreglass cracks at an internal angle. Whatever has failed is taken out, the upstand is formed properly, and the seams are welded or bonded.

Openings, abutments and warm roofs. A rooflight, a lantern, a Velux, a hatch or a soil and vent pipe each wants a kerb and a collar. Against a wall the cover flashing is chased in and dressed in lead, and a parapet has its coping and the tray behind it looked at. Most older roofs in Fordingbridge are cold roofs, with insulation between the joists and a dead void above where condensation collects and interstitial damp rots the deck unseen. Rebuilt warm, the insulation sits above the boards with a vapour control layer under it, so there is no cold void left for damp air to collect in.

We do not work to a price per square metre on a Fordingbridge roof. The felt you can see is the cheap bit; the boards under it decide the bill.

What the deck is. Fordingbridge garages and extensions from the seventies and eighties were mostly boarded in chipboard and felted. After decades of patch repairs, many of those boards have gone soft round the outlet and along the house wall. Firm ply can take a new covering straight over. Swollen chipboard cannot, and the test cut at the visit is the only way to know.

Where the roof is. A garage or single storey extension on an open drive is reached from a tower. A flat roof boxed in between two pitched roofs, or over a back addition in the older Fordingbridge streets, needs a scaffold that stays until the new deck is sealed. Because of the work at height rules, that platform has its own line.

Which way the water runs. Many older flat roofs were laid with no fall at all, so rain sits there and the roof ponds. Tapered firrings to create a fall add labour, but they are what makes a new covering last.

The covering. Torch-on felt, an EPDM single ply membrane and liquid-applied systems each have their own price, and upstands, edge trims and outlets are counted individually.

When you compare quotes, find out which covering each one means and in how many layers, whether rotten boards will be replaced or covered over, whether firrings are included, and whether the tower or scaffold and the skip are counted.

Fordingbridge sits in the River Avon catchment, and that brings in nutrient neutrality. It sounds alarming and for most flat roofing it is irrelevant, so it is worth being clear about when it bites. Re-covering an existing roof, repairing a dormer top or replacing a garage roof adds no new accommodation and the rule does not touch it at all. Nobody has to calculate anything and nothing is delayed.

Where it does apply is when the flat roof is part of a scheme that creates new overnight accommodation, such as a new dwelling or a self-contained annexe. Then the planning application has to deal with nutrients before New Forest District Council can grant it, and that adds time rather than roofing work. The practical advice is simple. If your flat roof is maintenance, get on with it. If it is part of a new home, or you are unsure whether your scheme counts, get the planning side moving early, because the roof will be ready long before the permission is.

Fordingbridge is 14.1 miles from our base in Boscombe. For flat roofs we cover the town, Sandleheath, Godshill, Hyde and the villages along the Avon, and New Forest District Council deals with the town's planning applications and building regulations.

Your contract would be with Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales with the number 15471719. The owner, Thomas Hannen, is the person who comes to lift a corner of your roof and write the price. One verified Checkatrade customer scored us 10 out of 10. We charge nothing for the site visit, or for the itemised quote in writing. Before you book a visit in Fordingbridge, you can read our customers' Google reviews, word for word, on our reviews page.

Most repairs in Fordingbridge need no application at all. What decides whether a change to the outside of your house does is who the council is, whether a conservation area or a listing applies, and whether the place sits in a protected landscape.