Roofing in Downton

Old clay, and what is under it. A quarter of Downton predates 1919 and the largest single cohort was built before 1900. The traditional covering through the village is plain tile in clay, with natural slate on the Victorian work and concrete tile on the post-war houses. Stone slate is not a Wiltshire covering and you will not find it here. On the oldest roofs there is no membrane at all: handmade plain tiles hung on riven battens over lime torching, with no sarking board behind. Those roofs fail through nail sickness, where the covering is still perfectly sound and every fixing holding it has rusted away. Half a dozen slipped tiles in one winter is the usual first sign.

On an old roof a leak rarely enters above the stain. Water runs along a batten or down a rafter and comes through several feet away, which is why we look from the loft first and why patching the visible spot so often fails.

Strip and re-cover. When the nails have gone, the batten ends have softened and the torching is falling into the loft, patching stops being worth paying for. The covering comes off, sound tiles are sorted and set aside for re-use, soft rafter feet are cut out, and the new roof goes back on breathable membrane and treated battens. In a conservation area the tile that goes back on matters, so we price a re-cover in matched clay rather than assuming you want the cheapest concrete option. Where the roof is not visually sensitive we convert ridge and verge to a dry fix system screwed onto a ventilated roll, the mechanical fixing BS 5534 expects. Where it is, ridge tiles can be re-bedded in a lime rich mortar that suits the building instead.

Old houses here have grown in stages, and every stage added another junction. Chimney flashings, soakers, secret valleys and the abutments where a later range meets an older one go back in code rated lead cut so it can move without splitting. Rear extensions, garages and porches come in felt, GRP fibreglass or EPDM rubber, and the deck gets looked at before anything else.

Cast iron gutters and downpipes on the older properties can usually be repaired and re-hung rather than ripped off. Rotten fascia and soffit almost always follow a gutter that has been running over for years, and clearing moss, algae and debris out of the run is ordinary maintenance. There is thatch in the parish and we are not thatchers: we will do the tiled roof and the leadwork alongside it and leave the thatch to somebody who does nothing else. Insulation, eaves ventilation and condensation are far cheaper to sort with the covering off, and Approved Document L sets the standard a renovated roof should reach.

No rate per square metre. Much of old Downton fronts straight onto the street in continuous runs, so a scaffold has to be planned around the neighbours and sometimes around the footway, and rear access is often down a long narrow plot rather than a drive. How long a platform stands matters as much as its size, and the work at height rules are why it is a priced line rather than an optional extra. Chimneys and valleys are priced one at a time. Ask whether battens and membrane are renewed or covered over, and what grade of lead goes on the chimney.