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What is the daily rate for a roof slater?


epsilonGreedy

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I am trying to understand the elements of roofing costs. Given a starting point of trusses erected, an easy step up to roof height from 3rd lift scaffolding, 30 degree pitch in a sheltered location, underlay, battens already installed and the customer funding materials, what is the daily rate for a slater in a low cost provincial English country?

 

My own research suggests they are some way down the trades pay scale compared to gas-safe fitters, electricians and brickies.

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roofers who can slate I know on 200 and upwards a day if not price work.

I think roofing is one of those things a lot of general builders have a go at and think they can do but are crap.

Make sure they're coming via recommendation

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Not sure I would go day rate as tbh as @Oz07 says, this is very visible and can cause significant issues if they get it wrong including leaks and potentially a strip and replace to resolve. 
 

This is not an area to cut costs - get 3 prices to get a feel of what is being offered and then go and physically see the work they have done previously. Lead work for example is something that separates the men from the boys here... 

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1 hour ago, PeterW said:

£1/slate laid including felt and batten

I second this. Spoke to a roofer when trying to sell my old roof slates and he charges 70p labour only... But he's a one man band and in northern Ireland so understandably a bit cheaper than other parts of UK.

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Is roofing Something most of us can’t tackle ourselves 
I had little experience in skating before myself and my wife slated our and the two double garages 

It took us about two weeks to do the house including the lead work 

and three day per garage 

We spent £150 on bumper hoist hire for a week 

 

I think there was around 300m2 

The quotes we received had no baring to any kind of a day rate 

 

12 -17 k 

 

both said allow 10% waste 

Rather than throw the bent slates off the roof I took nearly a 1000 back Saving about £1000 

Something a roofer wouldn’t do 

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Another one that did my roof myself.

 

I had a surprising amount of tiles coming off the pallet with broken corners.  There would have been 2 ways of dealing with this.  One would have been collect all the broken ones and demanding the merchant replace them, and then argue what is an acceptable level of breakages.  I took a more pragmatic view and used the broken ones as the cut tiles on the valleys.  It got to the point where I did not want to cut a perfect tile, so when I came to a cut, if I did not have any broken ones waiting, I simply unpacked more off the pallet until I found another broken one.

 

The end result was almost zero wastage.

 

It was not a technically difficult job but it was quite physically hard work, and took quite a long time.

 

I had no choice really, at the time I was building a house on an almost zero budget so no money to pay labour.

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2 hours ago, PeterW said:

Lead work for example is something that separates the men from the boys here... 

 

Where we are almost all the roofers use the same lead man.  He is very reasonable and does really neat welding etc.  I sometimes ask the roofers to exclude the cost of any specialist leadwork.  If they get the job they liaise with him and he bills me.  They still do soakers etc.

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I did my own roof from scratch, got loads of old west coast slate for virtually nothing , me and my dad re cut all the edges with  traditional slaters axes..... I then laid them in diminishing lengths to the top of the roof...... it took me months and months........ and months ? ..... it seemed fun at the time but All subsequent roofs on the property have been tin...... 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 08/09/2020 at 10:40, PeterW said:

Actually ... who is doing the layout on the roof and the membrane and battens..? Also, who is taking responsibility for the pitch and headlap being correct ..??

 

@PeterWI am just catching up on old threads of mine. I recall reading your reply and wondering how I could end up with the wrong pitch as this is preset in the trusses. Is there another pitch, might you be referring to ending up with a roof that has a very thin row of tiles or likewise strange tile widths bordering a valley. 

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On 08/09/2020 at 10:19, PeterW said:

£1/slate laid including felt and batten

As a validation of this. 

 

I have 340 sqm of roof, which results in just under 10k slates to be laid, 75mm headlap  and standard size of 400 x 250 is.

 

Planning cupa heavy 3's, assuming I do battens. 

 

All quotes include leadwork and labour. 

 

Cheap quote - 6k (self employed, local guy well known, medium quality level but could swing to low or high quality depending what guys he outs on site.)

Mid quote - 10k (self employed, unknown to me, recommended by cupa rep and has houses I can view and have seen pics of in local area. High level of finish with good grading of slates and finish)

High quote - 15k (two roofing companies,.work looks good but high cost). 

 

All central belt scotland 

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9 hours ago, epsilonGreedy said:

 

@PeterWI am just catching up on old threads of mine. I recall reading your reply and wondering how I could end up with the wrong pitch as this is preset in the trusses. Is there another pitch, might you be referring to ending up with a roof that has a very thin row of tiles or likewise strange tile widths bordering a valley. 


Pitch and headlap relate to the slates. Depending on the size of the slates, the pitch of the roof determines the headlap or overlap and the sizing of the slates too if they are diminishing size etc. 

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have actually enjoyed doing the battening and slating. I have not done all of it myself because getting water tight quickly is more important than saving every penny now the weather is beginning to be against us.

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On 04/10/2020 at 18:55, Puff said:

With just under 6000 to lay, think I'll be trying to do it myself as that's a chunk of budget I haven't got :( Long cold winter for me ahead I think!

 


Worth considering one of the systems like NuLok as doing double layer slating and punching / nailing them to fit will be a challenge if you’ve not done it before ..!

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On 07/10/2020 at 12:03, PeterW said:


Worth considering one of the systems like NuLok as doing double layer slating and punching / nailing them to fit will be a challenge if you’ve not done it before ..!

Thanks PeterW

 

I'm fortunate in that I have a good builder to hand to show me the way. He can then do all the stuff I can't do such as stone facing whilst I'm on the roof!

 

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  • 3 years later...
On 08/09/2020 at 17:29, nod said:

My wife’s a theatre manager 

and frightened of heights 

But soon got into the slating 0BC482F5-8A4D-41D5-9F05-850B091A146E.thumb.jpeg.b95c78d15c54ab568c5eb9a975c6a92e.jpeg

Five years on my wife become a bit of an expert 

I broke my hand whilst battening out our workshop and was only able to cut and carry the slates So she was left to slate it herself 

672E1FDE-4787-48AB-AB30-481493F5B6AB.jpeg

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