Building warrant for roof repair

"repairs" shurely - if you change it's shape that's "alteration" IMHO...

cheers Jim K

building control may insist on felt membrane, and on checking the scaffold.

I think if you have a roofing firm in they will deal with all of that.

I've just done some of mine, had to install new ventilation cos the wind wont get through the slates any more cos of the felt.

Also I insulated with kingspan the corner between the wall and the roof where my infrared thermometer had shown me there was lots of heatloss cos it was very thin.

And many tins of Halfords car body filler to rebuild the rotted timbers etc

[g]

ps i think theres a rule that if you repair more than a quarter then it needs felt etc, and maybe insulation too...

"structural alteration" - alterations to any part that forms the load-bearing structure. I think changing two or three rafters would be ok, but if a significant number of the rafters need changing, that's altering the structure.

(15 years in English local government, I'm having to relearn everything now I'm in Scotland ;)

JGH

replace, yes, repair no.

I think so.

Its bang in the middle of the grey area, but call up the BCO and ask anyway.

repair is demolition? repair without altering is alteration?

Just did the same to our whole roof - remove all tiles. Add new felt, replace tiles (+like-for-like where broken)

It needed the building regs. bit about change to an insulating bit of the building. So, limited (fixed price) charge and, in theory, we had to insulate to the current 2??mm insulation. (Which we did, though the inspector didn't check)

I would not accept a vapour permeable roofing membrane until I had seen references, because so many of them got BBA approval and were bluntly complete garbage even after numerous ridge & soffit vents added, added again & added yet again. If the roof is to be close boarded (eg, due to very low pitch), obviously the roofing membrane will need to reflect that :-)

Another note is w.r.t. the upstairs lights, may be worth a cursory examination to see if it a) has CPC present b) broken jn-boxes etc.

If you replace like for like there is no problem, but if you change from slate to tile or plain tiles to single lap or any other variations then you must go through regulations. It all to do with weight, local planning and conservation.

Unless the roof as been leaking for some considerable time there should not be any major timber replacment. Unless you mean by timber the slate or tile battens.

A new roof covering will require new breather able underlay, new battens, and of course new slates or tiles with matching ridge or hips (sometimes the ridge and hip tiles are reused), all new lead work, check to see if the guttering needs renewal

It's been leaking since before my FF moved in back in 2004. It got sufficiently worse last year for hunks of plaster to start falling. Apparantly, the landlord's builder's done a runner or something, I was trying to estimate how much delay there would be before anything was likely to get done.

JGH

It=92s hard to give advice with out a site view on timber damage. Water ingress usually doesn=92t rot timbers directly were water is getting in but will travel down timbers until there is a drop off point especially in valley areas. Valley boards under lead are noted for this. Lath & plaster ceilings soak a lot of water up before showing signs of a leak. Plasterboards usually go black with mould...

time to stop paying ?

Jim K

Well start a complaint paper trail at least. Shame for your Landlord but your the customer. Might if serious re building works are required or need doing to start looking to move elsewhere...

In England & Wales, the regulations are that if at any stage the work could adversely affect the structure, then it is what is called a "material alteration", and requires a Building Regulations application. This has been taken to mean that the replacement of the roof covering with a heavier or lighter material, replacement of rafters with a different size or strength class, or trimming out for a rooflight, would all be classed as a material alteration.

Replacing timber like-for-like may be difficult to prove; what strength class do you assign to a 100-year old 3"x2" spar? Pragmatism applies where a small number of rafters or other members are replaced, but the "taking the piss" rule applies if you end up replacing the whole roof.

There is also the recent "renovation of a thermal element" regulation, whereby significant renovation of a roof (usually 25% or more) requires you to upgrade the insulation. This also requires a Building Regulations application.

Of course in Scotland, YMMV.

The above is 100% correct and most applies to the rest of the country.

psst! - yep - he's a BCO...

Personal whim decision maker then,

at the very least he would appear to (consistently) know the rules - & you (whoever you are) agreed with him 100%....

I agree with the quote from the text book. but on site not always, its the personal whims that annoy. One will want it one way and another wont.