The roof goes first.
Roof painting across Christchurch. Long run steel, corrugate, concrete tile and pressed metal. We clean it down and treat it before any primer, and we prime it before any colour.
- Owner operated
- Christchurch
- Part of the Parthenon family
Paint is the last thing that happens to a roof.
By the time a tin is opened, four other things have happened up there, and every one decides whether the coating holds for years or lifts inside two winters.
We start with the wash. A roof carries years of grit, salt and oxidised coating, and none of it lets a new film grip. We take it off wet, at a pressure the sheet or tile can take, working down the roof so the mess ends up where we can deal with it.
Then the growth. Moss and lichen root into the surface, so blasting them off leaves the root behind and it pushes back through the new coating within a season. We treat them, leave it to work, and wash them off dead.
Then the metal. We look at every fixing, because a roof fails at its screws long before the middle of a sheet. We take surface rust back to sound metal and spot-prime it. We name a perished washer, because paint over a leaking fixing is paint over a leak.
Then primer, the coat that does the actual work. It grips the substrate and gives the colour something to hold to, and it is the one nobody sees. Only then, colour.
One
We wash the grit, salt and dead coating off
Two
We treat the moss and lichen at the root
Three
We check the fixings and spot-prime the rust
Four
We prime the whole surface
Last
Colour, and only then
It is not a colour change.
The coating is the only thing standing between the weather and the metal or the tile under it.
Steel roofs corrode from the coating outwards. On long run steel the factory finish is what stops the sheet going, and it has a life: once it has chalked back and the fixings have started to move, a recoat buys years for a fraction of new sheets.
A tile roof fails the other way about. The original surface wears off and the tile drinks water, so the fix is a skin rather than a barrier and the cleaning is most of the labour. Worth knowing which you own before anybody quotes it, and we settle that on the roof.
What we cover is the roof and what is attached to it: sheets or tiles, ridging and barge, flashings, fascia and spouting where they belong to the same look, and any surface rust, as a repair rather than an extra.
Sheet roofs
Long run steel and corrugate
Tile roofs
Concrete tile and pressed metal
The edges
Ridging, barge and flashings
If you want it
Fascia and spouting, where they match
What it is made of decides the job.
Four roofs, four problems, four products. We start by naming which is on your house, because rust through a sheet is a roofer rather than a painter.
Long run steel
Screws, washersThe most common and the most straightforward, and it lives or dies at its fixings, so we look at every screw.
Corrugate
Old and thinUsually older, often thinner, often coated once or twice already. What is on it decides what can go on next, so we check compatibility before anything is ordered.
Concrete tile
Porous, thirstyOnce the original surface wears off, the tile absorbs water and gets heavier and greener every winter. It wants cleaning that will not break it and a coating that soaks in rather than sits on top.
Pressed metal tile
Chip, grit and textureThe stone chip surface traps moss, grit and moisture in a way flat sheet never does, so cleaning is the long part. It also wants a coating that holds texture rather than bridges it.
What happens at ground level.
A roof repaint is one of the few jobs where the disruption lands somewhere other than the work. Everything that comes off the roof has to land somewhere, and where is a decision rather than an accident.
The wash is the messy part. Everything on your roof for fifteen years comes off in water, so the downpipes come off first rather than sending the lot into the stormwater. We rinse the paths and drive at the end of the day rather than leave it to dry into a mark.
We cover or tie back the plants under the eaves. Anything close to the house you would be upset to lose is worth naming before day one, because the treatment that kills lichen is not selective.
Cars off the drive, washing off the line, windows covered where we are spraying, and a word to the neighbour under the work before we start.
Downpipes
Off before the wash starts
Plants and garden
Covered, and named beforehand
Paths and drives
Rinsed, not left to dry into a mark
The neighbours
Told before we start, not after
From the portfolio.
A roof owes three photographs this company does not hold yet: as found, cleaned and primed, and coated. Until those land, here is finished work from other jobs, each linking through to its full record.
One reference, and it is a builder.
Daniel Fridd runs Parthenon Construction and has had Bevan on jobs of his own. A roof is the part of a house its owner never climbs up to check, so whose word you take counts for more here.
“He's one of the best painters I've seen. Perfection. Takes proper care.”
Daniel Fridd, Parthenon Construction
What people ask about roofs.
Six answers, and the second one is the one that saves people the most money.
How long does a roof take?
Two visits rather than one. We wash and treat it, then leave it: the growth has to die before it comes off, and the roof has to dry before priming. The gap is not a delay, it is what makes the coating hold. How many days depends on the roof and the weather, so you get that number at the quote.
How do I know if mine is worth painting?
We get up there and look. Surface rust at the fixings, chalking and growth are normal and fixable. Rust through a sheet, slipped tiles in quantity, or a roof at the end of its life are not painting problems, and we say so on the day rather than quoting a coat that is money spent twice.
Will it leak afterwards?
A repaint does not make a sound roof leak, and it does not fix one that already does. Painting over a leak turns a small repair into a ceiling.
How long does it last?
Years rather than seasons on a roof cleaned and primed properly, longer on the sheltered aspects. Nobody can honestly put a number on it from a website, because what decides it is the wash, the treatment and the primer, in that order.
Can you do it in winter?
The wash and the treatment, often yes. The coating, usually not: it needs a dry surface and a temperature range, and a Christchurch winter roof is neither for most of the day. Assess in winter, coat in spring.
Do you do the spouting as well?
If you want it. Fascia and spouting are quoted separately because plenty of people only want the roof, but a fresh roof above a tired fascia looks half finished.
While we are up there.
Safe access above ground level is most of the cost of working there, and it is paid for once we are on your roof. Four things worth quoting on the same visit.
Exterior Painting
The walls underneathThe same access, the same week. We wash the weatherboard, brick, plaster and joinery back and seal them before a coat goes near them.
Fence and Deck
The timber outsideWe strip it back and refinish it so the grain comes up instead of the flake.
Residential Painting
Inside and out, one jobThe roof, the walls and the inside quoted together, so you pay for the access once.
Commercial Painting
And property managersRoofs, spouting and exteriors on tenanted buildings, worked around the people still using them and the cars still parked under the work.
We get up and look.
A roof cannot be read from the driveway, so the ladder comes out before there is a number. The visit tells you whether it is a repaint, a repair, or a conversation for next year.
- 022 615 5816
Bevan, direct
- bevan@prd.kiwi
Email
Christchurch
Where we work