If your Attleborough home needs a full roof replacement, understanding exactly what happens from the first inspection to the final clear-up helps you know what to expect and what to look out for.
The decision to replace a roof rather than repair it again is not always obvious, but there are clear signs. If large areas of the tile or slate covering are deteriorating, if the felt underlay beneath has rotted and the roof space shows daylight or damp, or if the ridge, verges and flashings have all failed at once, you are usually past the point where repairs make financial sense. A full replacement addresses everything in one job and avoids the cycle of call-outs that a failing roof can generate.
Once the decision is made, the process follows a clear sequence. Knowing each stage helps you hold the roofer to account and spot if anything is being skipped.
A proper inspection goes beyond standing in the garden and looking up. The roofer should get onto the roof and into the loft space. From above, they are looking at the condition of the covering - whether tiles or slates are cracked, slipping or missing, how the mortar on ridges and verges is holding, and whether valleys and flashings are still doing their job. From inside the loft, they are checking the roof structure: the rafters, the ridge board, the wall plates at the eaves, and whether damp has tracked through the underlay into the timbers.
What the inspection uncovers shapes the scope of the job. If rafters are rotten or the ridge board has dropped, that structural work needs to be included in the price before any covering goes on. A quote given without a loft inspection is not a complete quote.
Safe access scaffolding is not optional on a roof replacement - it is a basic requirement for any job of this scale. The scaffold should fully deck the perimeter so that materials can be stacked safely, stripped materials can be lowered without dropping them, and the roofers have a safe working platform throughout. A scaffold erected properly at the start makes the whole job faster and safer.
Before stripping begins, the interior of the loft is sometimes sheeted to protect insulation and stored items from dust and debris. Neighbours should be given reasonable notice that work is about to start, particularly if the scaffold will sit close to a boundary.
Stripping is noisy and generates a significant amount of waste. Tiles, slates, old battens, torn underlay and redundant fixings all come off during this stage. On a roof that has been in place for several decades, the sheer volume of material can be surprising - a typical semi-detached house can produce several tonnes of stripped roof covering.
The old material is lowered to ground level in stages - usually via a chute or scaffolding hoist - and loaded into a skip or van. A skip positioned on the road may need a permit from the local authority; a good roofer arranges this before work starts rather than leaving a skip sitting illegally.
Once the roof is stripped back to bare rafters, the full condition of the structure is visible for the first time. This is the point at which any hidden problems - rotten timbers, spread eaves, dropped ridges - come to light. If additional work is needed, this is when it should be discussed and agreed, not after the new covering is half on.
Most roofs stripped for replacement need at least some timber work. Common repairs at this stage include:
None of this should be a surprise if the initial inspection was thorough. If it was, the cost of timber repairs will already be in the quote. If it was not, you may find yourself in a difficult conversation about additional costs once the work is underway - which is why the inspection matters.
Once the structure is sound, the new underlay goes on. Modern underlay is a breathable membrane rather than the traditional bitumen felt used on roofs built before the 1990s. Breathable underlay allows water vapour from inside the house to escape while keeping wind and rain out, which reduces the risk of condensation building up in the roof space.
The underlay is fixed across the rafters from eaves to ridge, lapped at the joins, and then battens are nailed across it horizontally at a spacing set by the tile or slate manufacturer. The batten spacing is critical - it determines where each row of tiles sits and how much they overlap. Overlap affects both weathertightness and how the roof looks when finished.
Tiling or slating begins at the eaves and works upward. The first course is bedded or clipped at the correct overhang above the gutter, and each subsequent row is fixed to the battens with either nails or clips, depending on the tile type and the exposure of the roof. In exposed positions, tiles should be mechanically fixed rather than relying on their own weight to stay in place.
Valleys are formed as the tiling progresses, using either lead-lined valley troughs, mortar-cut valleys in the tile itself, or purpose-made plastic valley units depending on the system being used. Each approach has merits; lead-lined valleys are the most durable but require a skilled lead worker to dress them correctly.
Chimney flashings are dressed in lead as the tiling reaches that level. Step flashings are cut into the mortar joints of the brickwork on both sides of the chimney, the back gutter is formed behind it, and cover flashings are fitted over the top and wedged and pointed into the joints. Cutting corners here is one of the most common causes of post-replacement leaks.
The ridge is the last structural line to be finished. Ridge tiles can be bedded in mortar in the traditional way, or fixed using a dry-ridge system with mechanical clips and a ventilated roll. Dry-ridge systems have become the more common choice because they do not rely on mortar that can crack and erode over time, and they allow the roof to breathe at the apex.
Verges - the edges of the roof over the gable walls - can also be finished with mortar or with dry-verge units. Dry-verge clips give a neat, consistent finish and remove another potential mortar joint from the equation. On an exposed roof, this matters: mortar verges on a poorly sheltered gable are a common source of loose tiles and ongoing maintenance.
Before scaffold comes down, the roof should be walked and checked. Every tile should be firm, every flashing tight, every valley free of debris. The gutters should be cleared of any tile dust or mortar droppings, because left in place they will block the downpipes at the first heavy rain.
The site should be left clean. All stripped materials, offcuts, packaging and any remaining fixings should be removed. A house that has had its roof replaced should look tidy - not as though it has had a skip emptied in the garden.
We carry out roof replacements in Attleborough and across the surrounding area, working from our base in Thetford. If your roof has reached the point where a replacement is the right answer, call us to arrange a proper inspection and a clear, itemised quote before any work begins.
No obligation · We usually respond within 2 hours
Storm damage, active leak, damaged ridge - we aim to be on-site within 24 hours.
