Roofing in West Parley

Underlay that has run out of life. The interlocking concrete tile roofs of the late 1960s and early 1970s were laid on bitumen felt, and felt is a consumable. It goes hard, splits along the batten line and tears where it drapes into the gutter, so wind-driven rain that gets past the tile has nothing to stop it. That is a strip and re-cover onto breathable membrane and treated battens rather than a patch, because you cannot replace an underlay from underneath. We say so plainly when that is what we find, and equally plainly when it is not.

Storm damage on open plots. A third of the village is detached and much of it sits with nothing upwind, so gusts get under the verge and lift from the edge inwards: missing and cracked tiles, a verge that has started to walk, ridge tiles off after a gale. BS 5534 sets out how a covering should be mechanically fixed for its exposure, and an open plot here is a more demanding site than a sheltered terrace. Mortar bedding of that age cracks and washes out, and we replace it with a dry ridge screwed to a ventilated roll and dry verge units at the gables, which takes the mortar out of the equation.

The bungalows and chalets here were extended repeatedly, and every addition brought another valley, another abutment and another change of pitch. Those junctions are where the leaks are: valleys relined, roof-to-wall abutments and chimney flashings re-formed in code rated lead, and any junction where two roofs of different pitch meet checked properly rather than sealed over. Garages, porches, dormers and the flat-roofed rear additions that came with all that extending go in felt, GRP fibreglass or EPDM rubber, and a soft deck needs replacing rather than covering.

On a bungalow the roof area per household is roughly double that of a two-storey house, so the same length of gutter is handling far more water. Undersized or blocked, it goes over the edge in the heaviest ten minutes of a storm, which is exactly when the ground here can least take it, so clearing debris, correcting falls and renewing split gutters and downpipes is not tidying. More than a third of the village is bungalows, the lofts are large and easy to reach, and the insulation job pays back faster here than almost anywhere we work. Ventilation and condensation are dealt with at the same time, and Approved Document L sets what a renovated roof is expected to reach.

No rate per square metre: on a roof that is the least useful number there is. A 1970s detached bungalow that has been extended twice, a chalet with dormers front and back and a 1990s detached house are three different jobs before a tile moves, though access on an open plot is usually the easy part. It is work at height, and the work at height rules are why the platform is a priced line rather than an optional extra. Ask any other quote whether the scaffold is in and whether battens and membrane are renewed or covered over.

West Parley is not in a river flood zone. What it does have is a high surface water rating, which is a different thing and a more local one: it means that in heavy rain the ground and the drains here struggle to take water away fast enough, and it ponds and runs across the surface instead. The Stour is about eight hundred metres off, but this is not really about the river. You can check any individual address on the government surface water and flood risk service.

That makes the rainwater side of a roof worth more attention here than the tiles get credit for. Everything that lands on the roof arrives at the gutter within minutes, and a gutter that overflows, a downpipe that has split at the back where nobody looks, or a shoe discharging onto a path that already has standing water on it, all put that volume exactly where it is least wanted.

On a bungalow, catching double the roof area through the same run of guttering, the margin is thinner than it looks. So when we quote a roof here we look at the whole path the water takes, from the tile to wherever it finally leaves the property, not just the part of it that is on the roof.

We cover West Parley, Parley Cross, Dudsbury and out towards Longham and Ferndown, broadly BH22, under Dorset Council. Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.