Roof repairs in Bashley

Roof repairs in Bashley

Mend the part that failed, keep the rest

Water coming through a ceiling right now? Ring 07435 839745 and tell us which room it is in.

Three faults account for most leaks on roofs like these. A verge tile drops onto the path after a south westerly. The felt at the foot of the roof turns brittle, so rain runs down the back of the gutter and stains the fascia. Or a damp patch on the landing ceiling grows each time it rains and nobody can say why.

Each is a fault in one part of the roof, usually a fixing, a bed of mortar or a strip of felt, with sound tiles around it. We go up, look into the loft from the hatch, photograph what we find and write down what it needs. If the whole slope has had its day, you will hear that too.

The repairs

What fails on Bashley roofs, and how we put it right

Around Bashley the homes are mostly bungalows and detached houses, largely built after the war and many in the eighties and nineties. A house of that age usually has concrete interlocking tiles on trussed rafters, a sand and cement ridge, bitumen felt under the battens and a felt roof on the garage or porch.

Ridge and hip tiles that rock. The mortar bed under a ridge or hip tile shrinks, cracks and lets go, and a gust lifts the tile off. We lift the loose run, clean off the old bed, and either rebed with a screw and clip through every tile, which BS 5534 now expects, or fit a dry system to BS 8612 with no mortar to crack. The ridge and hips of a bungalow take about a day. If one tile rocks and the rest are tight, we refix that one and leave the rest.

Verges on the weather side. The mortar under the end tiles of a gable washes out first on the south west elevation, because that side takes the driven rain. Once it drops out, wind gets under the verge and starts on the tiles behind. A clip-on dry verge unit over each end tile fixes into the batten ends and has nothing left to wash away. Two gable ends take about a day.

Slipped interlocking tiles. Roofs of this age were nailed on some courses only, trusting the tile's weight and its lock. When a nail rusts or a batten softens, the tile creeps down and opens the lap. We lift the tiles above, fit one of the same profile and clip it, because a tile that is nearly right leaves a gap in the side lock. A few tiles is a morning.

Felt perished at the eaves. The strip of felt that runs over the fascia into the gutter sits in daylight and goes brittle. It tears, and the water that should drop into the gutter runs behind it instead. We lift the bottom courses, cut back the dead felt and fit an eaves carrier tray lapped under sound felt. If the fascia board has softened, see fascias, soffits and guttering in Bashley.

Lead at a porch or a back extension. Where a lean-to or flat roofed addition meets the house wall, stepped flashing, soakers or a cement fillet keep the water out. Fillets crack, soakers split and lead pulls out of its joint, and the stain shows on the extension ceiling. We re-dress or renew it in rolled lead and repoint the chase. A flashing is about a day.

Valleys where an addition meets a hipped roof. A valley carries the water from two slopes. Mortar bedded valley tiles crack, lead or GRP troughs split or fill with leaves. The tiles either side have to come up to reline it, so allow one to two days.

Felt garage and porch roofs. Blisters, a split at the upstand and a pond round the outlet are the usual failures. Over a firm, dry deck a split can be patched in a few hours, and an overlay can buy years. A deck that gives underfoot is wet through and needs re-covering to BS 6229. More on flat roofing in Bashley.

A leak that is not a leak. In a shallow loft with insulation pushed into the eaves, damp air condenses under the felt and drips in cold weather. We check the eaves vents first.

Chimneys and flues. On older and post-war houses the stack leaks through cracked flaunching, lead pulled from its joints or a blocked back gutter, and a flue terminal through the tiles needs its lead slate sound. See chimney repairs.

The older listed houses. Bashley has a handful of listed older houses, most of them thatched, and one a cob farmhouse on Bashley Common Road under slate. Old slate slips when its nails rust, and a slipped slate is refixed with a tingle, a lead or copper strip hooked under its bottom edge. A thatched roof needs a specialist thatcher, because we do not thatch, though we can deal with the chimney lead or a tiled extension beside it.

When a patch stops paying. Soft battens or felt that crumbles across a slope mean the next repair will not be the last. That is a re-cover, for our roofers in Bashley.

How it runs

From your call to a written price

One person to ring from the first visit to the last. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: access, where the fault is and what is being opened up to reach it, each tile, slate, ridge or flashing being renewed and what with, making good, and disposal on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.

Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.

Part of Bashley lies inside the New Forest National Park and part is with New Forest District Council, so check your address on the National Park Authority's interactive property map. A like for like repair needs no planning application either way, as the Planning Portal guidance explains, but a listed cottage needs listed building consent before its roof is altered, and National Park heritage and conservation guidance covers the Park side.

If it is leaking now

Water coming through a ceiling

Ring rather than use the form. Put a bowl under the drip, keep anything electrical away from the wet patch, and if a ceiling is bulging keep everyone out from under it. The first visit is about finding where the water gets in and making the roof weathertight, and the permanent repair is priced in writing once the fault can be seen properly. On a Bashley house, tell us whether the drip is on the south west side, because verge and ridge bedding on that side is the first to let go in a gale. Scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm. For anything urgent, ring rather than use the form, and if we cannot pick up we ring you back as soon as we can.

Call now: 07435 839745

Repair or re-roof

The roof built in the nineties: sound tiles, tired fixings

The 1990s were the busiest building decade around Bashley, and a lot of homes here carry a roof about thirty years old. On a roof like that, the concrete tiles themselves are usually in good order. Manufacturers suggest sixty years as a reasonable life for a concrete tile, as BRE's testing of sixty year old roof tiles notes, so there is plenty left in them. What ages first is what holds them: the mortar under the ridge, hips and verges, the felt at the eaves and the lead at each abutment. BS 5534 now wants ridges and hips fixed mechanically, which the original mortar never was.

So when a roof of that age leaks, the answer is usually a repair. Refix or dry fix the ridge and verges, fit an eaves carrier where the felt has gone, and re-dress the lead. If someone quotes you a whole new roof while the tiles are sound, ask them to show you, with photographs, the rotten battens, the failed nails or the brittle felt across the slope that justify it. If they can, that is a re-cover, and our roofers in Bashley will price it. If they cannot, you are paying to replace tiles that have years left in them.

Nearby, and next door

Roof repairs near Bashley

Nearby places we also cover for roof repairs, with straight-line distances from Bashley, and the other trades we offer in Bashley itself.

Everything we do in New Milton Roof repairs, all areas Every area we cover