Broken tiles/slates

[SRE]

Has anyone "cracked" (sorry coudn't resist the pun!) issues around broken tiles/slates when the job is being done. We've had a few lately where the cost is more than we've estimated or as has happened this morning the tile is unexpectedly brittle and isn't stocked by anyone locally meaning ridiculous courier costs.

I don't feel we can charge the customer but wouldn't want to include the cost unecessarily as we're being squeezed on price at the minute anyway. Is anyone else coming across this or have wegot clumsy roofers and scaffolders

 

[Ramjam]

I weigh 16 stones and no matter how careful I am I always break tiles. We have a local tile supplier who stock a huge range of second hand tiles and slates, I take a broken tile down there towards the end of the job and buy three more than we've broken at the point I leave site. They cost between £1 and £1.50 so it's an irrelevance in the job overall and it saves my nerves, I just break em, replace them with ones that aren't under the array then fill in the gaps with equally weathered tiles, life was stressful before I found them.

 

[Markc]

Reclaim yards are a good source for us. We have a number very close to us which is handy. One tile I thought would catch us out, it had a locking lip on the top of the tile so a flat under side. In this case we stripped rows of tile off the roof before working on it. Just worked off the tile batten. Didn't break one using this method.

We also have large numbers of Norfolk Pan Tiles (Strange considering I'm in Norfolk!) They break as soon as you look at them. We tried spanning several tiles with scaffold boards under the ridge ladder. Just broke more this way! So again now we strip back rows of tile we need and walk up the tile batten. Surprisingly takes little extra time either.

As for tile cost we have had from £0 to £12 each! so far. Seems the newer tile being the costly.

 

[SRE]

Thanks for that - I don't think we've got a reclamation yard within 50 miles but I'm going to double check in the morning to be on the safe side. We were lucky in the end because our roofer happened to have a spare stash - just as well because I coudn't get any locally and after 2 hrs of phone bashing had tracked some down for £150 and even then they couldn't be delivered for 3 days. Cost was delivery from the manufacturer not the tiles which were a few quid each.

 

[ad_am7]

I own a roofing merchant in hertfordshire can provide tile matching service of new and reclaim, we can source pretty source much any tile or slate, if any solar installers need any help send me a message