Slate Roofing in North Melbourne ? Need Help ?

Established in the mid 19th century, North Melbourne is a popular old suburb located in close proximity to the CBD.

The original, mainly early and mid Victorian homes here, were nearly always installed with Welsh roofing slate. Being that most of this original roofing slate is now around 160 years old, a lot of it is nearing the end of its serviceable life and will need replacing over the next few years. Having said that, there is also some types of Welsh roofing slate that are still in good solid condition and have many years of useful life left, but can still cause you problems. What actually happens here is that although the slates themselves are OK, their fixing nails are rusting out and letting the slates slide down the roof out of position…. causing leaks.

North Melbourne slate roofed properties

Homeowners….. if your slate roof is leaking or causing you some problems and you’re unsure what to do about it, we can help you.

Builders……. If you have a project on, with a slate roof, that perhaps needs an extension or restoration we can assist you.

Here’s a recent slate roof renewal project that we completed for a builder in North Melbourne :

This very original Victorian era home was in a poor state when the owners recently purchased it.

The roof had been leaking for many years and there was a lot of timber rot that needed to be repaired as well as internal plaster repairs.

Before moving in they contracted a builder to completely restore the home as sympathetically as possible. We have worked quite a few times for this builder and after we inspected the slate roof we recommended it be replaced. The original slate on the roof was soft and there were many split and broken. In this instance it was far more economical to replace with a new slate. The SSQ Del Carmen Ultra slate was chosen as per our recommendation because of its similarity to Burlington blue slate. Burlington slates were – and still are – common on original Victorian homes in and around North Melbourne.

For some reason, done a long time ago, the hips and ridge capping had been changed from galvanized roll top capping to terracotta capping. The owners and the builder were a little confused as to whether these terracotta caps were original to the home or not. Victorian era homes with slate roofs would never have been installed with terracotta cappings. I dated these terracotta cappings at around the 1950’s era so probably someone just trying to modernise the home. Needless to say after the new slate was installed we used galvanized roll top ridging to finish the hips and ridges.

This slate roof replacement will give this home many years of worry free service.