Roof tiles

[Vet Tech]

Do roof tiles fail after a period of time?

I was looking up at the roof the other day and saw that there appeared to a couple of tiles missing. I then looked out the dormer window in the loft and saw that two half tiles were sitting in the rain gutter.

House is a 1928 build and to date have not experienced any roof problems.No one has been near the roof in the last 8 years so physical abuse can be ruled out.

Given the age of the roof tiles, can I expect others to fail in the near future and might I be faced with retiling the whole roof? Or should I get someone round to just replace the pair. I am fortunate in that I have a dozen left over from when the dormer was put in 8 years ago.

VT

[John Rumm]

Depends on the tile and the amount of time. As a general rule, they don't tend to suddenly expire. The odd slippage and breakage is normal for most roofs of a certain age.

Unless there are problems evident on many tiles like them spalling their surface off due to water absorption, or the underlying roof timbers are rotten, I would just replace the missing tiles.

[Phil L]

if they're from 1928 they must be rosemary tiles? - red, 6 inches wide by about 10 inches long and half an inch thick? FWIW you can still get them, new or reclaimed, but 'replacing a few' can be fraught with hazzards, namely, you'll break 4 for every one that you replace!!

Like everything else, they do degrade over time - frost being the worst culprit, but 2 tiles is nothing to get agitated about - the chances are, they've been cracked for years and have only recently snapped, and if you aren't getting any rain ingress, I wouldn't worry about it. If you do want to get someone in to replace them, try and get some other small jobs done at the same time, it'll be cheaper as he's still going to charge you for half a day, and 2 tiles will take him fifteen minutes, and ten of those will be spent getting and then replacing his ladders off the van!

[Nightjar]

When I bought my house, nearly 20 years ago, the surveyor noted that the tiled roof was getting on for 60 years old, which was around its expected life span. I've not had to do anything about it yet.

Colin Bignell

[Jim]

Tends to be the nails that rust into nothingness leading to the odd tile coming adrift. Has it been re-roofed since being built? If you don't know, try looking in the loft to see if there is felt visible under the tiles.

[Rick Hughes]

Tiles may have cracked with someone putting a ladder on them in past .. or due to water freezing in hairline crack. If it's only a few tiles - hen just have them replaced.

[Vet Tech]

No, it has never been re-roofed but a loft conversion has been done so I have no means of checking from inside. Even before the conversion, there was boards and a type of felt covering so the tiles were never visible from inside.

VT

[Vet Tech]

If it came to a matter of replacing all the tiles, is there a recommended modern replacement for these rosemary tiles that looks similar but has advantages such as being more durable?

VT

[Phil L]

You can buy new rosemary tiles if you want to keep the same appearance, or very close to it, but they are no more durable than the old type, and they cost a lot more than 'standard' roof tiles, given that each one only covers

150 X 100mm, wheras standard ones cover 300 X 300mm.

The other drawback with rosemarys, is that you have to use 3 times as many roof battens.

You can get standard tiles in the same colour as rosemarys, but obviously it's not just colour that makes a roof.

[The Natural Philosopher]

just replace and take no teeth sucking implication that 'the whole lot orta come down'.

the odd one does slip..wind damage maybe. Metorite damage? Birds getting underneath. Whatever. Mostly they don't even need to be nailed down...slide one up until it catches on the laths.

[The Natural Philosopher]

I roofed a section in rather pricey but lovely looking tudor style tiles.

is good, tiles are similar enough to lay easily on constant pitch lath, yet vary enough, especially if you use three different colours, to look 'traditional hand made'. And they don't look dead even flat and boring like machine tiles or slates do.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Mothers house apart from a couple of slipped tiles. was built in 1953, and the new owners haven't re roofed it either. Done just about everything else though..

I would say 120 years for a decent tiled roof done in the 50's.

[Tony Bryer]

On Fri, 13 Aug 2010 14:36:51 +0100 Nightjar When I bought my house, nearly 20 years ago, the surveyor noted that the

Back when I was a BCO in SW London, lots of semis in Surbiton were having to be retiled at about the 50 year mark because the Belgian clay tiles were disintegrating. Meanwhile in next door New Malden, where Wates were the dominant builders, the 1930s Marley concrete tiles looked as if they would last for another 50 years - IIRC concrete roof tiles do now come with a 100 year guarantee.

Of course if you'd been around in that era you might well have been badmouthing new fangled cheap and nasty concrete tiles as against 'proper' clay tiles.

[andrew]

I've just had a small bungalow re tiled, we got the secondhand tiles for free by removing them from a demolition, breakage was such that the large 4 bedroomed hose just yielded enough tiles for the one bedroomed bungalow. In the couple of months since about 10 tiles have broken away at the overlap. Tiles were from an interwar built house and concrete, they were noticeably thinner after the overlap, which the builder put down to concrete leaching in acid rain. There was no sign of spalling such as with clay tiles.

A long time a go I had a bit of involvement in the local hand made clay tile business, a fitter I used maintained their pug mills etc and a fellow woodman had started his working life theire as a pieceworker. I used to demonstrate the technique at a building conservation fair using workstations still current from way back, including making the pegs. The company rep acknowledged then that concrete tiles had superior life and the clay tiles would fail from frost damage as long as the roof was pegged otherwise it was rusting nails breaking out the corner.

AJH