Pitched Roofing

Most houses around Stockport wear a pitched roof, and most of the problems we get called to start the same way: an old sarking felt that has gone brittle, mortar-bedded ridges that have cracked and let water track in, or nails that have rusted through and let slates slip. We build pitched roofs so those failure points aren't there to begin with.

What a pitched roof job actually involves

Whether it's a small bay roof or a full house, the anatomy is the same and the details are where roofs are won or lost:

• Breathable membrane instead of the old bitumen felt, so the loft can vent and condensation doesn't rot the timbers.
• Treated battens gauged correctly for the tile or slate — the wrong gauge is the reason so many re-covered roofs leak at the laps.
• Dry-fix ridges and verges — mechanically fixed rather than bedded in mortar, which is what the current British Standard expects and what stops ridge tiles ending up in the garden.
• Stainless or copper nails and clips so the fixings outlast the covering.

Slate or tile?

On the older terraces and villas — plenty of them in Heaton Moor and Edgeley — natural or fibre-cement slate keeps the right look and the planners happy in conservation areas. On the interwar and post-war semis that fill Bramhall, Cheadle and Hazel Grove, a good concrete or clay interlocking tile is usually the sensible, cost-effective choice. We'll tell you honestly which suits your roof and your budget, not which one earns us more.

New builds and extensions

We tie new pitched roofs into existing ones all the time — dormers, garage conversions, single and double-storey extensions. The join between old and new roof is exactly where botched jobs leak, so we lead-flash it properly and match the covering as closely as the existing weathered tiles allow.

Every pitched roof we re-cover comes with a written 10-year workmanship guarantee, and we're fully insured for the work.