Advice
Signs your roof needs repair
Most roof problems announce themselves long before water reaches a ceiling. Ten minutes with a pair of binoculars from the far side of the road, and a look in the loft on a bright day, will tell you nearly everything you need to know.
Slipped or missing slates and tiles
On an older slate roof the nails corrode long before the slates do. One slate slips, the ones around it follow, and you get the characteristic gap-toothed look along a course. From the ground, look for dark gaps, slates sitting out of line, and fragments in the gutter or on the path after wind.
A single missing slate is more urgent than it looks. Water reaching the battens and underfelt spreads sideways, rots the timber quietly, and the first thing you see indoors is a stain a long way from the actual hole.
Failed flashing around chimneys and abutments
Where the roof meets a chimney stack or a wall, lead flashing is what keeps water out. Old cement fillets used in place of lead crack and fall away, and lead itself can split or lift at the edges.
Damp on the chimney breast in an upstairs room or in the loft, especially after driving rain from one direction, almost always means flashing rather than the roof covering. It is a straightforward repair and worth doing at the same time as any chimney repointing while access is up.
Ridge and hip problems
Ridge tiles are bedded on mortar that eventually cracks, washes out and lets the tiles rock. Look along the ridge line from the ground: gaps in the mortar, a tile sitting proud, or vegetation growing out of the joint all mean the bedding has gone.
This matters more than people expect, because a loose ridge tile in a storm is both a leak and a falling object. Re-bedding or a dry ridge system fixes it for decades.
Flat roof failures
On a flat roof, look for standing water that never drains, blistering or bubbling in the surface, splits at corners and upstands, and lifted edges where the covering meets a wall. Blocked outlets are behind a surprising number of flat roof leaks.
Small splits and failed upstands are repairable. A covering that is brittle, widely cracked and past its service life needs replacing rather than patching, and anybody who tells you otherwise is selling you the same repair twice.
Signs from inside
Go into the loft on a bright, dry day with the light off. Daylight through the roof, dark staining or mould on the rafters, damp felt and a musty smell all point to water getting in.
Downstairs, the classic signs are a stain on a ceiling that reappears after every heavy rain, peeling paint at the top of an outside wall, and damp around a chimney breast.
FAQ
Signs your roof needs repair - common questions
Yes - slate and tile repairs, re-bedding ridges, lead flashing and flat roof repairs. We do not take on full re-roofs, and we will tell you honestly if that is what your roof really needs.
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Honest advice from a family-run brickwork specialist serving Richmond and South West London since 1946.