I've a standalone garage at the side of my house. It was constructed in 1965 of concrete slabs on a concrete base and has an asbestos cement roof and is about 5.5m x 3m. The garage leans slightly (a few degrees to the vertical away from the house) as a result of ground movement over the years, which has caused the roof to sag and to leak in heavy rain. Although the roof sheets themselves aren't damaged, the roof is basically shot and needs replacement.
Two questions:
What relatively low cost options do I have for replacing the existing roof?
If I decided to replace the whole garage (it ain't pretty) what's the degree of difficulty of demolishing this type of garage and what options do I have these days for material/construction/price of a new one? (i.e. similar size and standalone)
You might want to consider the bitumen type corrugated roof (stocked by for example B&Q and Wickes). It comes is several colours and is easy to cut with and oiled hand saw. I used this stuff when I built my garage, which incidentally replaced an old asbestos cement (AC) on cruddy concrete slab job.
Assuming that the garage is a white AC construction, your local waste disposal sight might take it, I got confirmation from my council on this issue (the local tip wanted to charge me until I mentioned this).
In the end I decided to get a registered asbestos disposal company to dispose of it as I had no means of getting circa 2 ton of asbestos to the tip.
The asbestos disposal industry has a bad rep for fly tipping etc, so it might be worth checking with the local council and/or trading standards before employing them to see if they have form in this respect. For my single 5x2.5m garage it cost £500 last year, this I beleive is quite cheap I also had quotes of 2 or 3 times that IIRC.
The timber frame of my garage was quite rotten and the blokes who took it apart did so with hammers, wrecking bars and saws (for the timber), I could have done this myself.
FYI there is a report at
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which finds that asbestos cement products of this nature are not particulary hazardous, its might be worth reading for peice of mind before embarking on such a project.
When I rebuilt my garage I used a concrete slab, timber frame, and trussed roof with the corrugated bitumen sheet roofing.
I made the frame from 3x2 "scant" stud sections screwed together with
3"/4" screws, trusses joined with the same (and nail plates).
I stood the frame on a single course of medium density concrete blocks (this is not visible, bricks would be better if visible) and put a damp strip in between the blocks and stud frames.
The whole thing is clad in 4.5" shiplap. Doors are still temporary softwood ply!
IIRC the whole lot was "around" 1K inclusive of the asbestos removal.
Main costs of this approach:
Asbestos removal. Studding timber. Shiplap cladding. Corrugated roofing. Concrete slab. Sub base if you need it (intend to actually put a vehicle in it - mines storage really). Breaker rental.
It took me 8 days work including breaking the concrete, skipping it, and digging out / leveling, getting the concrete in and building the new structure.
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