Beacon Basingstoke Roofing

Roofers in Winklebury

Winklebury is a suburb 2 road miles west of Basingstoke, built out from smallholdings in the late 1960s as the town took Londoners as an overspill. Its roofs are mostly tile-covered estate houses with flat-roofed garages beside them, now at an age when we go up, take photographs and put a fixed quote in writing.

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An Edwardian red-brick detached house with clay tile roof and tile-hung gables in north Hampshire

Roofs we see in Winklebury

  • An Edwardian red-brick detached house with clay tile roof and tile-hung gables in north Hampshire

    Overspill estate houses

    Until the late 1960s Winklebury was a collection of smallholdings, and then Basingstoke's growth as a London overspill town turned it into a housing area. Housing of that period was commonly roofed with concrete tiles over felt underlay, with the ridges bedded in mortar. They are now old enough that the underlay and the ridge are the first parts to need attention.

  • Roofer fitting roof tiles on a brick house near Basingstoke

    Flat-roofed garages and extensions

    Alongside the houses sit garages, porches and kitchen extensions with flat roofs, usually built with layers of bitumen felt on a timber deck. Felt of that age cracks and blisters, and ponding water finds the weak seams. Because the garages stand open to the weather on their own, a leak in one often goes unnoticed for a long time.

  • White uPVC fascia, soffit and guttering under a tiled roof

    Timber rooflines on the estates

    On houses of that era the fascia boards, soffits and bargeboards were commonly painted softwood, and they have lived through five decades of paint cycles. Where gutters have leaked or the paint has failed, the timber rots from the bottom edge. Replacing it in uPVC or aluminium, with the gutter, is the usual fix.

2 road miles west of Basingstoke

Planning and building control in Winklebury

Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council is the planning authority for Winklebury, and its building control team checks roof work too. The best-known designation is the hillfort, Winklebury Camp, a scheduled monument (Historic England list entry 1003559), which covers the ancient earthwork itself, not the housing built around it. Check the borough's conservation appraisals page if your road is near the older parts of the area and you are unsure of its status.

On most estate houses, building control matters more than planning. Small repairs and partial re-covers generally need no application, while bigger jobs do, and then the roof's insulation can be required to meet current standards. We deal with the notification when it applies. If you want a roof window in the loft, see our roof window planning guide before you order one.

What we find on Winklebury roofs

Winklebury's houses went up quickly in the years after the late 1960s, in runs of similar design, and that helps us. A fault found on one roof in a run is often present on its neighbours, at a similar stage.

Chapter 1: The flat roof on our Winklebury garage leaks. Is it worth repairing or does it need replacing?

What we find

A garage built in the overspill years almost certainly started life with bitumen felt laid over boards. Felt is a layered sheet, and as it ages it loses its oils, hardens and cracks, particularly where it turns up at the wall (the upstand) and along the front edge. Where the deck has sagged slightly, water ponds and sits on the felt. Ponding speeds up every other kind of failure, because the standing water stays against the weakest seam.

Inside, you may see a damp stain on the plasterboard, drips in one corner, or rusting on anything stored below. From outside, bubbles under the felt, cracks that look like crazed paint, and moss in the low spots point to a roof near the end of its life. Boards that feel spongy when pressed from below mean the leak has been going on for some time.

What we fix

A small split or a lifted seam can be patched, and we do that where the rest of the felt is sound and the boards are dry. If the felt is cracked widely or the boards have gone soft, patching only buys a season or two, and we say that plainly. Re-covering means stripping back to the deck, replacing wet boards and laying a new membrane, in EPDM (a rubber membrane supplied in one sheet), GRP (fibreglass resin poured and cured in place) or torch-on felt.

Typical UK prices per square metre are felt £60 to £100, EPDM £80 to £120 and GRP £100 to £160; the survey comes first and your fixed quote follows it. Our guide to flat roof leaks and the flat roofing page for the full picture.

Chapter 2: Do the ridge tiles and gable edges on a 1970s Winklebury house need dry-fix?

What we find

On the houses built for Basingstoke's growth, the concrete tiles are generally still sound while the mortar that bedded the ridge and verge has not fared as well. The mortar shrinks and cracks as it ages. Once it loses its grip, the capping tile rocks in its bed, and a strong gust can lift it or drop it into the garden. The edge of a gable roof (the verge) loses its tiles the same way, because it is also held by mortar.

Spot the fault from the pavement: gaps in the pointing along the ridge, a capping tile out of line, or mortar crumbs in the gutters. With a run of similar houses, neighbouring roofs often show the same wear, so one neighbour's loose ridge is a good hint to check your own. Inside, daylight along the ridge or a stain near the apex confirms water is getting in.

What we fix

We lift a few capping tiles to confirm the tiles are good and only the bed has failed. Under BS 5534 the ridge, hip and verge need a mechanical fixing as well as, or instead of, a mortar bed, so we normally refix them dry: tiles screwed or clipped to a batten with a breathable roll underneath, and dry verge caps along the gables. The kits themselves are tested to BS 8612.

Where only a few tiles have loosened, a repair to that section may be all that is needed. Where the whole line has gone, a full refix is better value than repeated callbacks. Typical UK ranges for refixing a semi's ridge run from £900 to £1,600 plus £300 to £900 for scaffold, and the fixed quote comes once we have surveyed. See our signs of ridge tile failure guide and the ridge tile repairs page.

Chapter 3: How do we know whether the fascias and gutters on our Winklebury house need replacing?

What we find

The roofline is the strip where the roof meets the wall: the fascia board along the eaves, the soffit underneath it and the bargeboards at the gable ends. On houses of this age, those were often painted softwood, and they have had decades of weather. Paint blisters and flakes, water gets into the end grain and the timber softens from the bottom edge upward. Gutters fixed to a soft fascia start to sag, and then they leak at the joints.

Poke the lower edge of a fascia with a screwdriver: if it sinks in, the board is rotten. Other signs are a gutter with a visible dip, green streaks down the wall below a joint, or birds getting into the roof space through a gap at the soffit. Over time, water that overshoots a sagging gutter can reach the bricks and the tiles behind it.

What we fix

We take off the gutters, cut out the rotten fascia and any soft soffit, and fit new boards in uPVC or aluminium that need no painting. Each board is checked to make sure it is tight to the rafter ends, and an eaves tray or a strip of felt is added where the underlay stops short of the gutter. New gutters are set to a gentle fall towards the downpipes, with fresh joints and brackets at a sensible spacing.

If the rafter ends are rotten, we tell you and repair them before covering up. The cost of a whole uPVC roofline on a semi typically runs from £1,800 to £3,500, with scaffold hire between £200 and £2,600 depending on access; you receive the fixed quote after the survey. Our rotten fascia boards guide explains the signs, and the guttering and fascias page covers the rest.

Chapter 4: How much life is left in the original tiled roof on our Winklebury house?

What we find

The original roofs on Winklebury's estate houses are now well into the second half of their working lives. Concrete interlocking tiles last a long time, but the layers beneath do not. The felt underlay under the battens dries out, tears at the laps and sags between the rafters. The battens themselves can rot where leaks have gone unseen. None of this shows from the road, which is why a roof can look fine and still be near the end of its time.

The signs inside are brown rings on ceilings, a musty smell in the loft, daylight through the roof boards, and cold, damp patches along the top-floor walls in winter. Outside, look for tiles that are crumbling at their edges, a roof surface that has gone dark and rough, and patches where moss holds water against the tile. Any of these means it is worth getting the roof looked at.

What we fix

We look at the loft first: the state of the underlay, the battens and the timbers, and how many tiles are worn through. If the tiles are good and the felt is only torn in places, a repair that keeps the roof going for years is sensible. If the felt has perished across a slope, patching stops making sense, and we recommend a strip and re-cover with new breathable underlay, new battens and either the cleaned tiles or new ones.

Building control may need to be told about a whole-roof re-cover, and we make that notification. Putting new concrete tiles on a three-bedroom semi is reported at £6,500 to £10,500 as a typical UK range, and the fixed quote arrives after the survey. Our guide to how long concrete tile roofs last explains the ageing process, and the roof replacement page shows how a re-roof runs.

Winklebury roofing questions

How do you survey a roof in a long run of near-identical Winklebury houses?

We survey and quote your roof on its own, but a run built to one pattern shares details: the same ridge, verge and eaves arrangement. Knowing where that pattern tends to wear lets us look at the likely weak points first, from outside and from the loft. If a neighbour has had work done recently, tell us, because it helps us judge what stage your roof has reached.

Is my house near Winklebury Camp affected by the scheduled monument?

The scheduling covers the Iron Age hillfort itself, not the streets built around it. Houses nearby are treated as ordinary homes for roofing purposes. If you are unsure about a particular plot, ask Basingstoke and Deane's planning team. We can give you photographs and a written description of the work to show them, if you need to ask.

Can you repair one garage roof on a run of identical garages?

Yes. Each garage roof stands on its own, so we survey and quote only for yours. We check the felt, the deck and the edge trim, and say whether a patch will hold or whether a re-cover is better value. Matching the neighbouring garages is usually possible if you want the row to look consistent.

Our roof looks fine from the road. Is a survey worthwhile?

Often, yes. On estate roofs of this age the faults are under the tiles: perished felt, soft battens and eaves that no longer carry water into the gutter. We look from the loft as well as outside, and photograph what we find. If the roof is in good order, we tell you so and you pay nothing for the visit.

Do you handle old asbestos cement sheets on garages around Winklebury?

Some outbuildings of this era have corrugated asbestos cement sheets. Do not drill, jet wash or break them. The HSE treats taking down whole, unbroken sheets as non-licensed work, as long as the job is assessed for risk, controlled and done by trained people; sometimes a new roof laid over the top is the alternative. We tell you which suits your garage after the survey.

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