Roofing ladder - madness stupidity or both

[Dave]

The ridge tiles on my 3 bed semi need repointing! A few tiles lost cement pointing in the storms a few years ago and were "patched up" by a local skywalker! The repair as held so far but from inside the loft I can see some daylight - it was not a great job really/

I have a quote for a builder and he's asking £800 to "do the lot". I think that means to properly remove the ridge tiles (hope I'm calling them the right things here - the half-round tiles that straddle the apex of the roof), and re-seat and point them. The roof shape is a horizontal section some 8' long from the chimney breast to a point that divides in two ridges - each approx some 15' (?) long that slope straight down toward the guttering. It looks a very steep angle to me

- but the worse parts are on the horizontal

The £800 is a lot of dosh for me so I had this mad/stupid/mmm/clever (delete as appropriate) idea to buy a roofing ladder and have a go myself! I already have a double extention ladder with standoff - and have replace all the guttering myself - so am used to the height as far as that anyway. Now I *know* heights are dangerous and that care and some skill is required. However I am not too bad at general DIY and mech/elec/wood things - but cement and roofs are not my areas! My question is: just how stupid is this as a DIY job?

If it sounds sensible - how much would a decent roofing ladder cost - any sites you can reccomend that sell them?

(I have done some pointing on brickwork (admittedly using readmix), but it looks pretty good and is still in place after 10 years.)

While I've written this post in a (hopefully) lighthearted way I do understand working on a roof is no picnic - but really would appreciated any practical advice on the wisdom of doing this - or ideed *how* to do it. Thanks

ps Apols if I've used the incorrect terms above. Please make allowances with your superior knowledge.

[Ken]

£800.00 for that lot sounds reasonable to me. Don't forget, roofers and builders have to have two men for this work , assuming they do it from ladders and to take off all those ridge tiles, clean off the old mortar and then run them again takes a long time.

ken

[Weatherlawyer]

Don't be silly, it's not a weeks work. OK thee may be scafolding involved on the hips he calls valleys. I am not sue I have pictured his roof very well.

A roof ladder can be made in a couple of hours for a few quid out of roof battons and 1 3/4" screws. Make a long one to get up the roof and a short one fro moving along the ridge.

Where is the felting under the tiles though? The cement mix can be easily made in a bucket a few trowelfulls at a time. 4 or 5 to one is plenty. You only need a few dots under each tile.

You'd easily have the job done in a day. That is if there is no slope involved. I wouldn't know how to go about that.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Almost certainly used the wrong mortar. Ridge tiles always move relative to the main roof. If it must be mortar, lime mortar is better.

[The3rd Earl Of Derby]

Where are you? I'll do it for 400GBP. ;-)

[Jim Alexander]

If you Google for roof ladders you will find several online suppliers, however quite an investement for 8' of horizontal ridge. If you do decide to diy and I've no idea how to do the sloping sections, HSS charge £30 for a weekend's roof ladder hire. Its hard work for a diyer because you will probably want to continually reposition your ladders but a roofer would likely just work on the ridge. Get some more quotes and firm up on the spec first, "the lot" tells me nothing. Also do some weightlifting so you are comfortable handling your roof ladder (15kg typically) at the top of your extension ladder.

Jim A

[tony sayer]

In article , Weatherlawyer writes

Well if you must DIY that then make a bl**dy good job of it.

Suppose its down to how much you value your existence on this planet!.

Go and buy one.. and only do the job if you feel confident working up there!....

[Lobster]

I bought the Screwfix ridge hook for £26:

's OK within limits - certainly feels sturdy enough in use, as in, I don't think it's any more or less dangerous than a proper purpose-made ladder. Problems are that it's a right faff fixing it to the ladder (lots of nuts to do up) so is only suitable for someone like me who only has very occasional need for it. The other thing is that AFAICS it's totally unsuited for use with an extending ladder (contrary to what the blurb says) as it needs to transmit force in both directions when you either pushing it up the roof or climbing up it. I now have a quite long 2-part extension ladder, and just use the ridge hook with one section on its own, which is adequate for short roofs only.

David

[Jim Alexander]

Ditto, and I totally agree with your point about the nut faffing. I use it with a 4 section folding ladder to avoid the whoops where did the lower section go problem, resting on 3" x 2" bearers to keep the hinge point loads off the tiles.

Jim A

[Andrew Gabriel]

This is exactly my experience with it, and I have used it exactly once -- to fit an aerial onto the chimney.

Same here. It never occured to me that one could use more than one part of the latter with it.

[Ken]

I still maintain that £800 to take off and rebed 2 x 15ft hips plus an 8ft ridge is reasonable for a roofer/builder.

ken

[West Stand Bowler]

This really is a job for a roofing contractor Dave. Some skill is required in removing and rebedding the ridge / hip tiles. Especially the hip tiles. As for pricing, about £500 is the going rate. Shop around.

-- WSB

[meow2222]

It can, but there are gotchas, and when you're over 2 floors up it only takes one gotcha to kill. I dont mind using home made ladders in some situs, but I wouldnt want to take one onto a roof 2 1/2 floors up. The other issue is weight, when youre sitting on the ridge and need to pick up and swing a ladder, choosing a heavier wooden one can be dangerous.

It all sounds perfectly diyable, but if youre not skilled & experienced or are using home made ladders I'd suggest getting a safety harness and slinging a rope from it round a chimney, then if anything goes wrong youve got no worries.

NT

[Guy King]

The message from "West Stand Bowler" contains these words:

And not the Rod Hull Roofing Consortium, either.

[The3rd Earl Of Derby]

If you're not confident of shinning up a homemade roof ladder it begs the question of your DIY skills?

There is nothing complicated about screwing two lenghts of timber with x amount of slats(rungs together,with a 2x2 screwed to the top for a overhang of the Ridge.

Once this is positioned securely over the ridge up you go, sit on the ridge and use your arse cheeks to slide along the ridge in relation to your arms pushing you along the ridge after each ridge tile is done.

[The3rd Earl Of Derby]

Shinning up&down the ridge ladder qaudruples the chance of slipping, now arsing along the ridge tiles minimizes the chance of danger.

[Owain]

Oh aye, no worries.

Quite apart from the fact that a fall arrest harness could be useless or worse if it's not suitable for the application and used properly, not much consolation if you're swinging on the harness and see the chimney start wobbling before it follows you rapidly groundwards.

You'd be better off with a barrel of bricks ...

Owain

[keith_765]

"The3rd Earl Of Derby" wrote in message news:xuuzg.109941$ [e-mail]...

Ok let look at this rebedding and pointing of ridge & hip ridge job. Right youve put the ladder up and hopfully tied it to the roof by taking out some tiles to access the tile laths. The next job is to get the hook over the ridge, best place is in the middle of the ridge section and youve tied the crawler (roof ladder) to the ladder. Next thing is to get the mortar up to the top of the ridge, where are you going to put this buckit of mortar, will it balance on the ridge can you fit it between the runs of the crawl board. Next youve got to remove the ridge tile to enable to place the mortar in line on the tiles. What do you do with the ridge tile while you reach to get the mortar out of the buckit. Remember you are 2 storys up trying to move your body in 180 degs sitting on the ridge tiles keeping the buckit of mortar from crashing down the roof. You havent even tried doing the hip ridge yet and theres no where to hang a crawl board. Hip ridge, you take off the first one at the bottom and the others start to slide down and you are up there with a buckit of mortar and a hip ridge. Oh and dont forget you may have to replace the old hip iron at the bottom of the hip and clean off all the old mortar off the tiles. I think you will find that £800 sound a better idea, proving they are taken off rebedded and pointed not just pointed. By the way anything less than 2 sand & 1 cement is a waste of time. Ive seen some of theses home made crawl boards, hanging over ridge tiles, no thanks.

Keith

[The3rd Earl Of Derby]

In answer to your bucket balancing problem(not that it is mind)

Take a square piece of wood, take another two pieces of wood, cut a *V* shape out of those two pieces of wood,screw them two pieces of wood to the Square piece of wood...hey presto a wooden support that sits over the ridge tiles to put your bucket on. :-)

[Michael Chare]

Wicks to a kit to convert a normal ladder to a roofing ladder for £25

Use a climbing rope and climbing harness to make sure that if you do slip you won't fall far.