Roof repairs in Tolpuddle

Roof repairs

A wet ceiling under a cottage roof, and where it starts

If water is coming in now, ring 07435 839745 and say which room it is in and what kind of roof sits over it.

Perhaps a damp patch has spread across the back kitchen ceiling, under the lean-to, after heavy rain. Perhaps a pantile has slid down the outbuilding roof and you can see bare battens from the garden. Or the mortar round the pots on a chimney has cracked and there is grit in the gutter below it.

We look from the ground, from a roof ladder where safe, and from the loft, trace the water back to where it gets in, and repair that point. You get photographs and a written price for the roof repair, not for a new roof you do not need.

The work

Lean-tos, stacks and the tiles that slip first

Along the old core of the village, the list entries describe main roofs of thatch over cob and brick. The thatch is not ours to touch. What was built onto it is: pantile and plain tile lean-tos, tiled hoods over bays and doors, and brick stacks. Here is what goes wrong.

Pantiles that creep down a lean-to. A pantile is a single curved clay tile that overlaps its neighbour with a shallow side lap. On a low lean-to that lap leaves little margin. A tile that has lost its nail, or whose nib has snapped off the batten, slides down and opens a gap, and the end tiles at the verge lift in wind before any others. We lift the course above, slide in a matching pantile and fix it with a nail or clip, in line with BS 5534. Double Roman clay tiles and concrete interlocking tiles are refixed the same way, each with a matched profile.

Half-round and crested ridges. On a clay tiled range the ridge tiles sit in a bed of mortar. When that bedding lets go, a ridge tile rocks, then lifts off in a gale, and the open joint lets rain onto the top batten. We lift the loose tiles, clean them and rebed them in a mortar to suit the roof, matching any broken one from reclaim. A crested ridge is part of how an old roof looks, so it goes back as it was.

The joint where a lean-to meets the house. This is the likeliest source of a stain in a room under a lean-to. The top course of tiles runs up to the wall of the main house, and a strip of lead or a lime fillet closes the gap. Once the lead works out of its joint or the fillet cracks away, rain runs down the inside of the wall and can show well away from the junction. Where the lean-to runs along a side wall, soakers under each tile and stepped lead over them do the same job. We cut out what has failed, dress new lead over the top course and seal it into the wall to suit what the wall is made of. On cob that means lime, as the section below explains.

Brick stacks. The stacks stand along the ridges or at the gable ends. The flaunching, the sloped mortar round the pots, cracks in frost and lets water down the flue. We renew the flaunching, repoint the stack and renew the flashing, soakers and back gutter. Where a stack comes up through thatch, the seal at its base is worked into the thatch, so that part is planned with your thatcher. More on chimney repairs.

Slate on a later section. Where a section has been added or rebuilt in slate, the slates outlast their nails, which rust through, and that is nail sickness. A few slipped slates each get a tingle, a lead or copper strip hooked under the bottom edge. Once slates are coming loose across a whole slope, every nail on it has gone, so that slope is stripped and hung again on new nails.

Valleys where a wing joins. Where a tiled rear wing meets a tiled range, a valley takes the water from both. Old lead splits where it has been walked on, and leaves dam it until water rides over the edge. We lift the tiles either side and renew the lead in lengths short enough to move.

Flat roofs on rear additions. A felt roof on a rear addition fails at blisters, splits and the upstand against the old wall. A split over a firm, dry deck takes a patch. A deck that gives underfoot is wet right through and will not hold one. See flat roofing in Tolpuddle for felt, GRP and EPDM.

Gutters on the tiled parts. A blocked lean-to gutter spills water over the back onto the fascia until the timber goes soft. We clear it, free the downpipe and outlet, and replace a rotten board. More on fascias, soffits and guttering in Tolpuddle.

After a gale. Check the verges and ridges from the ground and take a dated photo of any gap for your insurance claim. A temporary sheet goes over it first, and the permanent repair is priced once it is dry.

Repair or re-roof. A lean-to with sound battens and straight rafters needs its tiles relaid, not a new roof. One whose rafters sag in the middle, or whose battens crumble wherever a tile comes up, has run out of repairs. That is whole-roof work for our roofers in Tolpuddle, and we show you the photographs that tell you which it is.

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.

On an unlisted house in the Tolpuddle Conservation Area, a like for like repair needs no planning application. Tolpuddle has 27 listed entries, and on a listed cottage even a repair can need listed building consent from Dorset Council, so check your address before any work is booked.

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. When you ring about a Tolpuddle roof, say whether the wet room sits under thatch or under tiles, since that tells us whose job it is. 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

Thatched cottages

Thatch above, pantiles below: who fixes which

Walk past Pixie's Cottage or Hammer Hill and you see how the old village was built. The list entry for Pixie's Cottage describes thatch over plastered cob, with a lean-to and a rear addition both in pantile. Hammer Hill adds a pantiled former outbuilding and a tiled roof over its bay. So when a ceiling stains in a back room, the first question is which roof is above it.

We repair the tile, pantile and slate parts, the lead or lime fillet where a lean-to meets the wall, and the brick stacks. The thatch, its ridge and the wire netting over it go to a specialist thatcher. Cob is soft and has to dry out through its face, so a flashing into plastered cob is sealed with lime. Hard cement or mastic at that joint holds water inside the wall.

If the thatch eaves drip straight onto a lean-to, its tiles can be sound and still get soaked, so look at that drip before paying for a re-tile. On a listed cottage, photograph the fault and ask Dorset Council before even a like for like repair.

Nearby, and next door

Roof repairs near Tolpuddle

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

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