I have to re felt our wooden shed roof.
Local builders merchants have sent me down the road of roofing felt and felt adhesive. It is a 5 by 7 foot shed in a corner of the garden. I can get access, with difficulty to most sides of it.
Any hints or tips on what not to do?
I have never worked with felt before and now the weather has warmed up, I might just go for it next week.
Dave
The only dont I'd say is don't use cheap stuff. Otherwise its not a tricky job - mind you, when using bitumen based adhesive, be sure eveything you're wearing can be binned.
NT
Yes, I have been warned about that. Including the gloves
Thanks
Dave
You get get throw away overalls. If the roof is not tongued and grooved, best cover everything inside the adhesive will cover everything. Do it on a warm day, it makes the felt easier to handle.
I've never used adhesive, just felt nailed down. Nor have I ever come across a shed where the felt was stuck down - be a bugger to get up.
Can't see any reason to use adhesive if you get the overlaps right.
Pent roof or apex?
The Totality of Human Knowledge (Felt Roofing) is in the Ruberoid Blue Book (linked from
Interesting, but not really relevant to a shed?
Don't even go down the felt route - it's messy, can be physically quite hard work, takes considerable time, is a headache to clear up from and unless you use top quality material is life limited.
Use Onduline or it's equivalent. No nasty adhesive, no problems with eaves and trying to fold unwilling material, light, quick to install (an afternoon in comparison to at least a day and a half), no clear up mess, has a longer life and is no more expensive once you take all the various rolls of felt and adhesive you have to buy.
Rob
Yes. I did a really nice job with the shed felt, and it lasted about a year. Buy proper stuff and ignore the garden shed stuff.
In message , Rob G writes
Well, I'm part way through Ondulining my shed roof. Having a day off after waking up with cramp this morning and only now just about able to walk.
It is much easier and more satisfactory than felt, although I wonder how easy it would be to use on a smaller roof with a lot of cutting necessary. In the end I went ahead and am fixing with screws and a mixture of Dowty washers and screw caps, neither of which fill me with much confidence. I'm still surprised that there seems to be no 'official' alternative to nails
The roof I'm repairing was felted by my brother-in-law and myself some years ago (maybe 7 or 8) with decent quality felt and was glued. He's a perfectionist so we did a good job. Then last year, suddenly it started to wear through at the apex and the lengthways-laid felt seems to have shrunk, exposing the glue on every overlap. Weird how it suddenly failed.
I've found it straightforward, no clean up needed, even when using bitumen, other than binning stuff, and much cheaper than onduline.
sounds like you use the basic old fashioned stuff. Better felt is flexible, even in cold.
Do you know how long ondu lasts yet?
NT
We use something locally called 'rubberoid' or similar. It's usually a roll of roofing sorta gritty on one side and smooth on t'other.'Last lot I got was about half metre wide IIRC. We usually glue the overlaps and use large headed galvanised 'roofing nails'. Also on one roof used nails with large tin 'washers'; where high winds had torn some previous roofing off the very low angle shed roof. Our shed number one similar size to the OPs lasted some 20 years before needing repairs in this pretty severe eastern Canadian climate. All our three existing sheds and a previous and a 20 by 12 foot cabin built by a pond, have been on wooden posts set into the ground. And built mainly from left-over and salvaged materials. The inspiration for our Number 2, for example, was that someone gave us a bunch of sheets of used plywood. That shed contains, among other things, our four summer wheels and tyres for pickup truck. Time now to get the winter tyres off! May 1st is the deadline unless extended by governemnt order during a particularly long hard winter! After some years of use on mainly bare winter roads time next fall to buy a new set of four studded winter tyres. Can't put them on vehicle til end of October if recall regulations correctly though! Probably about $700 balanced, installed incl. sales tax for four light truck tyres, we reckon. That includes some pro-rated road insurance if tyres get damaged etc. Never had to use it but nice to have with some of the winter damaged road potholes!
I had what I can only now describe as cowboys to erect a 14ft by 10ft shed for use for my disabled son it is leaking so I thought to wrap it in felt but dont really want black is there an alternative that is weatherproof and can be stained or a coloured felt I've tried getting the cowboys back unfortunately theyve blocked me
Well take them to court and claim your money back and then get a decent crew on the job from scratch. The design of sheds is half the battle of course, since if its rubbish to start with, you can't make it right. Brian
Are these leaks just in the roof, or elsewhere?
You can felt in a number of different finishes including smooth, and sandy, or "mineral chipping" finishes. Colours range through a selection of grays and greens. You also get underlay felts and "cap sheets". When a roof is felted properly, you would typically have one or two layers of underlay, and then a capping sheet to finish.
You must buy a much higher quality of shed than me John. Mine only come with enough felt to nail on a single layer.
I was wondering the other day why most flat roofing comes in dark colours, when that causes it to get hotter and so suffer from more thermal expansion issues. That's probably a contributor to why garages etc roast in summer.
Is it feasible to paint flat roofs a lighter colour?
Theo
If it is just the roof, don't bother re-felting it, just put galvanised or plastic coated, box-section steel on or EPDM and forget about the likelihood of future leaks for decades.
If it is a "peaked" shed, I wonder if the felt was started from the apex rather than the edge. The next piece then overlaps the wrong way - ie not like a tile above another tile below it. That will eventually lead to leaks as rain trickles down beneath the layers.
FWIW, I put a single layer of Wickes el cheapo (green) felt above the previous felt, and it's now been there 7.5 years without problem.
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