Roofing in Sandleheath

Slate, and the nail behind it. Natural slate on the older cottages, and slate seldom fails as slate. What goes is the nail. A slope that drops two or three every winter, from all over the slope, not one spot, has nail fatigue, and hanging another clip on each one is money after money.

The honest answer is to strip, sort the sound slates and re-lay. Beside the slate there is plain tile and clay tile on the old ranges, and concrete tile, much of it interlocking, on the later houses. Stone slate is not a covering of this valley. On interlocking concrete the tile outlives what holds it down, so the fault is a nail or a clip. We do not work on thatch: where a tiled range adjoins a thatched one the flashing along that join is nearly always where the water gets in, and we work on our side of it only. If all you need is one slipped tile put back, a loose hip re-set or a drip by the chimney traced, that is on our page for roof repairs in Sandleheath.

Ridge, underlay and ventilation. Mortar bedding cracks and washes out, and the tiles begin to rock. On a post-war house we convert to a dry fix system, dry ridge and dry verge screwed onto a ventilated roll, the mechanical fixing BS 5534 expects. On a Victorian roof a dry system can look wrong on the building, so there we re-bed in a softer mix that gives before the tile does. One roof in five here predates 1919, and those went on lath with no sarking board and no underlay whatever, which is why a re-cover on an old house is a bigger step up than one on a newer house: breathable membrane, treated battens and stainless nails go on, with soft rafter feet cut out first. Do the ventilation at the same time, because a membrane over a roof built to breathe changes how it dries, and Approved Document F covers what a roof space needs.

Old houses in Sandleheath carry more chimneys, valleys and abutments than modern ones, and every one is a junction. Flashings, soakers and abutments go in code rated lead cut so it can move without splitting, and cement fillets are replaced with lead, never made good again. Extensions, garages and porches go in felt, GRP fibreglass or EPDM rubber, where the deck, the falls, the upstands and the outlet decide the life of it. Cast iron rainwater goods are worth repairing rather than swapping for plastic, and with trees close to a lot of these roofs, moss and leaf debris pack the run. Loft insulation, eaves ventilation and condensation are far cheaper to sort while the covering is off, and Approved Document L sets the standard a renovated roof should reach.

Roofs are not priced per square metre. On a roof here, the age of the house decides most of it. Age and covering. About a fifth of the houses in Sandleheath were built before the First World War. Their roofs are often natural slate or handmade clay tile on hand-cut rafters, sometimes with no underlay at all. Matching those, or reusing what can be saved, takes longer than laying a modern concrete tile on a post-war semi or bungalow.

Access. Where the back of the house can only be reached through a gate, the scaffold goes in by hand. A fragile old covering needs crawl boards and a roof ladder, never boots. The work at height rules make access a priced line.

The details. Chimneys, valleys, abutments and the lead flashing at each junction are priced one at a time, and on an old cottage the chimney is often the part needing most work. New battens and membrane go on to BS 5534, which means more fixings than the original roof ever had.

What is underneath. Rafter feet, wall plates and sagging purlins only show once the covering is off.

Comparing quotes? Ask whether the scaffold is included, whether battens and membrane are renewed or covered over, whether slates are reused or new, and who pays for the skip.

Most repairs in Sandleheath 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.