Valleys • Flashings • Soakers
Leadwork Medway
Lead is what keeps the joints in a roof watertight, and it is where cheap work shows up first. Valleys, flashings, soakers and parapet gutters, dressed properly.
Free inspection and a clear price. No mastic, no cement fillets, no short cuts.
Call 01634 907 234Done once, lasts decades
Proper Lead, Not A Smear Of Sealant
Everywhere a roof meets something else - a wall, a chimney, another slope - there is a joint, and the joint is where water gets in. Lead is what closes it. Done properly it outlasts the covering around it. Done badly it fails in a couple of winters and takes the ceiling below with it.
Two things ruin leadwork: using too light a code for the job, and fixing it so it cannot move. Lead expands and contracts a surprising amount with temperature. Pin it down over too great a length and it will split, every time, along the same line.
We size the lead to the detail, keep each piece short enough to move, lap them properly and clip them so wind cannot lift them. It is slower than sealing it, and that is exactly why it lasts.
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What you get from us
What Proper Leadwork Buys You
The right code for the detail
Heavier lead where it takes weather and foot traffic, lighter where it does not. Using code 3 where code 5 belongs saves a few pounds and costs you the job.
Sized so it can move
Pieces kept to the correct length with proper laps, so thermal movement is designed in rather than fought against. That is what stops the splitting.
Lead, never a cement fillet
A cement fillet where lead belongs cracks as the two materials move apart, then quietly feeds water into the wall behind it. We take them out rather than repair them.
Leadwork We Take On
Lead detailing on pitched and flat roofs across Medway:
- Valley gutters - lead-lined valleys between two roof slopes, renewed or repaired.
- Chimney flashings - front aprons, step flashings, side soakers and back gutters.
- Roof-to-wall abutments - where a lower roof meets a wall, chased in and dressed rather than sealed over.
- Parapet gutters - the lined channel behind a parapet wall, cleared, relined or rebuilt.
- Dormer and bay cheeks - lead sides and tops on dormers, bay windows and porches.
- Soakers and secret gutters - the hidden detailing that stops water tracking in behind the covering.
If you can see white salts, a wavy line or a split running along a piece of lead on your roof, it is at or past the end of its working life.
Common questions
Leadwork Questions We Get Asked
Properly specified and fixed, sixty years or more - often longer than the roof covering around it. Undersized or over-fixed lead can fail inside five.
It is a thickness rating. Code 3 is thin, code 8 is heavy. Each detail on a roof has a code that suits it, and the common fault is somebody using a lighter code than the job calls for because the sheet was cheaper.
Almost always because the piece was too long, or fixed at both ends, so it could not move with temperature. The split usually runs in a straight line at the point of greatest stress. Replacing it in shorter lengths solves it permanently.
Sometimes, by lead welding, which is a proper repair rather than a patch. But where the lead failed because it was the wrong code or wrongly fixed, repairing it only resets the clock on the same failure.
There are proprietary alternatives and they have their uses on some details. For valleys, chimneys and abutments on a house that is meant to look right, lead is still the material that lasts and the one that looks correct on an older roof.
Less than it was, but it happens. On an exposed or easily reached roof we can fit lead in a way that makes it harder to lift, and marking systems are worth considering. Worth a word with your insurer either way.
More from Gillingham Roofing
More Of What We Do
Towns we cover
Leadwork Across Medway
We carry out lead valleys, flashings and parapet gutters on properties across Gillingham, Chatham, Rochester, Strood and Rainham. If your leak is at a joint rather than in the middle of a slope, this is usually the answer.
Call 01634 907 234