Synthetic slates Vs natural slates and colour scheme

[romario]

Hi All,

 

I had some delay due to other work commitments.

I am now back with the build and I need to decide between synthetic slates (Tapco / Britmet) and natural slates.

 

I've put it below my thought process that might be useful to some but I would love to ask the community two questions:

 

 

1. What colour would go for the roof for that project?

Brown or Black

 

2. Would you go with synthetic slates or natural slates?

 

 

Here is mine decision making process based on limited knowledge:

Synthetic (Tapco, Britmet)

Positive:

All uniform thickness, no selection needed. Also because of that possibly less sticking out edges on the round shape.

Easier installation as lighter and pre marked for gauging

Less likely to get damaged if I need to walk on them

 

 

Natural Spanish slates

Positive:

Cheaper

Possibly fewer slates as  the required overlap is smaller and the gauge is larger

Proven long term durability and appearance

Natural product

Non combustible 

When cut it still have original edge finish.

 

The roof pitch is 25degree

 

I have attached few photos

Architect 3d vision

Roof trusses

Trial with synthetic slates to help me decide on the product and colour

 

Thank you in advance for your comments

 

[Alexphd1]

Nice build.

 

Can't help to much with your questions but we have tapco slates in pewter grey, they have slightly faded over a 24 month period. They seam to stabilised now though. 

[nod]

We used Spanish Mainly due to planning constraints 

It took my wife and myself three weeks to fix and a week for the two garages We returned a 1000 slates that weren’t useable 

All time consuming 

If we had got a contractor in these would have been thrown off the roof 

 

We will look at synthetic for our next build for the reasons that you have already stated 

[markc]

Cool build, credit to you for escaping the rectangular box house

[Mr Punter]

Welcome back @romario.  The walls look good.

 

I thought the roof would be a big challenge.  You could go natural slate, small format clay tile or metal.  With slate you may need diminishing courses and it could be that every slate needs cutting.  Definitely for a specialist to advise.  The small clay tiles may be easier and are used a lot on oast houses.  Can you let us know what you go for and post some more pictures?

[epsilonGreedy]

Both look good at the moment.

 

A grey/green slate or red would match the freshly clad wall wood colour but five years later when the cladding is silver grey?

 

Red pigments tend to fade over time, will that apply to those red tint artificial tiles?

[romario]

15 hours ago, Alexphd1 said:

Nice build.

 

Can't help to much with your questions but we have tapco slates in pewter grey, they have slightly faded over a 24 month period. They seam to stabilised now though. 

Thank for your sharing your experience.

[romario]

14 hours ago, nod said:

We used Spanish Mainly due to planning constraints 

It took my wife and myself three weeks to fix and a week for the two garages We returned a 1000 slates that weren’t useable 

All time consuming 

If we had got a contractor in these would have been thrown off the roof 

 

We will look at synthetic for our next build for the reasons that you have already stated 

Thank you for sharing your experience.

You've raised a question in my head.

If you go for natural slates and you get some that you are not happy with is it a normal practise that those can be returned /refunded?

[romario]

12 hours ago, markc said:

Cool build, credit to you for escaping the rectangular box house

I am not sure if I can get the credit

I bought the land with planing granted for the roundhouse so I suppose there was no competition from professional developers when buying the land.

I suppose my job is to try to make the best of it and look at the positives of the roundhouse 

 

[nod]

40 minutes ago, romario said:

Thank you for sharing your experience.

You've raised a question in my head.

If you go for natural slates and you get some that you are not happy with is it a normal practise that those can be returned /refunded?

The merchant said while they may not look pretty on your new roof

They are fine for roof repairs 

and at the price that we where paying for quantity They are quickly snapped up 

 

Make no mistake most roofers would chuck them off the scaffold 

I would take around 50 down the ladder each day and stack them in my trailer 

The defected ones where worth over a £1000 to us 

Nothing to a roofer

 

I will definitely look at synthetic for our next two builds 

[Cpd]

I am not an expert but have hand cut a good few thousand natural slates and slated my own roof and a few others, my question is how does it work when the circle becomes tighter ? Do you NEED to cut every slate and if so what is going to be easier- natural or synthetic ? Once you know this it’s just a matter of finding the right texture/ colour.  Hand cutting slates is a  slow and tedious job and if being done by contractors could cost a whole lot of money. I have seen quite a few amazing conical roofs made from natural slate and they are just beautiful when done well, I had hoped to build one myself but after cutting thousands of slate for my own standard roof I have decided I have better things to do with my time and will look at using metal instead. Pictures are just a couple of internet grabs and show what looks like bespoke slate cutting to get the desired result - a serious undertaking on a roof of you size. 

[romario]

13 hours ago, Mr Punter said:

Welcome back @romario.  The walls look good.

 

I thought the roof would be a big challenge.  You could go natural slate, small format clay tile or metal.  With slate you may need diminishing courses and it could be that every slate needs cutting.  Definitely for a specialist to advise.  The small clay tiles may be easier and are used a lot on oast houses.  Can you let us know what you go for and post some more pictures?

Thank you Mr Punter for your comments.

The current pitch of the room is 25 degrees which is ok for the synthetic slates and just about ok for natural slates. Because of the weight I haven't spent too much time on clay tiles.

Initially I was planing to cut every slate to achieve perfect half bond.

However, as the top rafters are nearly 8m long and the spacing in rafters goes from 600mm centres on the outside to 190mm in the centre that means if I started with 300mm wide slate at the bottom the slates on the top would need to be less than 100mm wide.

I am not sure how such a narrow slates would look on the large roof.

 

Then I've started considering going for random pattern which would be a lot more efficient.

However on each next raw I will need to loose few slates.

This will need to be done by either cutting 3/4 slate or half slate.

This may not look pretty...

 

[Mr Punter]

I think the bottom courses should be fine without cutting.  Maybe look at diminishing courses.  Some firms - like SSQ, can supply slate in a variety of sizes.  Obviously start with longest at the bottom.  Mix the widths on subsequent courses to achieve an acceptable random bond.  As you progress towards the top, you may need to mitre.  You may be able to order some pre-mitred.  If you soak the battens in water you can persuade them around a fairly tight radius.

[romario]

On 01/02/2021 at 21:27, Cpd said:

I am not an expert but have hand cut a good few thousand natural slates and slated my own roof and a few others, my question is how does it work when the circle becomes tighter ? Do you NEED to cut every slate and if so what is going to be easier- natural or synthetic ? Once you know this it’s just a matter of finding the right texture/ colour.  Hand cutting slates is a  slow and tedious job and if being done by contractors could cost a whole lot of money. I have seen quite a few amazing conical roofs made from natural slate and they are just beautiful when done well, I had hoped to build one myself but after cutting thousands of slate for my own standard roof I have decided I have better things to do with my time and will look at using metal instead. Pictures are just a couple of internet grabs and show what looks like bespoke slate cutting to get the desired result - a serious undertaking on a roof of you size. 

 

Thank you for your comment and the pictures. I've seen those pictures as well online and that particular room is probably one of the best I've seen.

That person cut every single slate to achieve the half bond. However, you can see how narrow the slates are at the top and the top rafters where not that long.

I think I will probably need to go for random pattern but it  is difficult to visualise until you put couple hundreds slates...