Top marks for SpecMaster on mixed ownership estate

Employing the Redland SpecMaster service has enabled Wigan Metropolitan Borough Council (MBC), which manages and maintains 22,000 homes, to benefit from a 15-year guarantee and avoid costly extras when it re-roofed 40 properties on one of its estates in Kitt Green. This professional specification not only avoided unsightly and expensive detailing, but also accelerated the roofing programme through introducing the Innofix Clip, the award-winning tile fixing developed by the company.

Wigan-based BAAS Construction, who works in partnership with Wigan MBC on a design and build basis, has a long-standing relationship with Redland; and brought in the SpecMaster service to help Wigan answer both difficult design issues and provide the guarantees required for their client and stakeholders.

“The 15-year guarantee is important to us because it means that we shouldn’t have any unexpected financial burdens put upon us at Wigan within this period and in the unlikely event that there is a problem with the new roof covering, Redland will still attend site and rectify the issue free of charge”, Brian Hampson, Project Manager, explains.

The 15-year guarantee that is provided when the tiles are installed with recommended fixings under the Redland SpecMaster service covers weather tightness, durability and design liability. SpecMaster is a free-of-charge roof specification service for architects and professional specifiers that covers slates, tiles, fittings, accessories, fixings, ventilation, underlay and battens – all in NBS-based format to integrate seamlessly into any building specification. The service also enables clients to work with the specification manager to achieve the optimum performance.

The service was also able to tackle the issue of replacing only one half of a roof so that it matches the other, which arose because the 40 units are on an estate of mainly semi-detached homes in Kitt Green that is in mixed ownership as some residents exercised their right to buy. This means one roof could be in private ownership while the other would be council-owned. Therefore unless the owner occupier engaged with Baas Construction and re-roofed their property at the same time, it was impossible to re-roof both as one unit.

The existing roofs were tiled in Double Romans and Wigan MBC wanted to re-roof using a Redland 50 Double Roman but was keen to avoid installing a bonding gutter. “Installing a bonding gutter is expensive, time-consuming and, in my opinion, doesn’t look attractive”, Brian comments.

The gauging of the existing tiles was crucial as to whether re-roofing required the bonding gutter and the roof pitch dictated the required tile headlap but, once Baas Construction was on site, the Redland Specification Manager checked the roof pitch from the scaffold level and confirmed the pitch at 22.5^o and the existing tiles were correctly gauged out with headlaps between 75 and 85mm – so bonding gutters weren’t needed.

The scheme was completed with the 50 Double Roman tile in Tudor Brown and Innofix Clips used to fix the tiles, an innovation that impressed the roofing contractor, C&B Roofing, because they are so much quicker to fix and therefore speed up the contract.

Managing Director Mark Cain says: “We were concerned at the degree of clipping we had to do on this re-roof scheme but the new Redland Innofix Clip made the job so much quicker and easier. The new clip overcomes all the problems we get with the traditional nail and clip fixing, such as when knots in battens stop nails being driven home, and the method of holding the clips together means the tilers don’t get all the clips tangled up. The single item fixing really reduced our timescales and allowed us to complete the roofs much quicker”.

Completely tool-free, the Innofix Clip is available for the entire range of Redland’s concrete interlocking tiles, and was developed to meet the increased fixing requirements set out in BS 5534 British Standard Code of Practice for Slating and Tiling.

It is the only tile clip available that doesn’t need a hammer, making it the fastest and easiest fixing on the market. In fact, it’s up to 40% quicker than using traditional nailed clips. They come ready to use in a unique magazine style holder ensuring they are tangle-free and can be easily removed from the packaging with one hand. Suitable for use throughout the UK, Innofix is Redland’s strongest clip yet and meets the stringent requirements of the British Standard.