There has been some, warranted, criticism for our readership that the blog hasn't been updated for a few months now. I will try to make more effort to keep you all up to date on our progress.
Anyhow, last autumn we decided that we couldn't put off replacing the pigsty roof any longer, as one more winter could see it collapsing in on the mower. I got a few hints and tips from Robert, our friend the builder, and got to work stripping the old roof off.
Robert came up with the idea of clearing a few holes and then putting a stepladder on the gallery floor so that I could strip the roof of without having to clamber all over the top of it.
This worked quite well, although I did have to lean right out a few times, which was a bit scary.
We manage to save most of the tiles to reuse and as you can see, there were a hell of a lot of tiles to shift, for such a tiny roof.
This worked quite well, although I did have to lean right out a few times, which was a bit scary.
We manage to save most of the tiles to reuse and as you can see, there were a hell of a lot of tiles to shift, for such a tiny roof.
Now I had to replace a few rotten joists, at the weather end of the pigsty before we could start re-roofing.
The plan was to work from the inside, building the back of the roof up from the bottom up to the ridge. This involved nailing voliges (strips of wood) onto the joists and then laying the tiles on top, two rows of unders topped by a row of uppers, none of which are fixed down but are just held in place by the weight of the tiles. This worked well to start with, but as we got further up the roof I found that every time I nailed on a new volige the tiles all started to slide down the roof towards the lane.
I tried to drill holes in the unders, so I could nail them down, but the other tiles still slid. We even tried putting props under the roof joists to soften the hammer blows a bit, but it still didn't work.
We went to see our dutch friends Joop and Cathelijne to see if they had any tips that they had picked up from doing their own roof. Joop said that the only way was to lay all of the voliges before you climbed onto the roof and laid the tiles. No more safe working from the inside.
Luckily for me, Joop offered to come over and help us lay the tiles on the back of the pigsty, facing into the road. This was a great boost, as there was nowhere that we could build a scaffold on that side.
So, that Saturday, Joop clambered up a ladder, and Tina, Cath and myself worked as a chain gang, lifting all the tiles up onto the roof. It was all finished by lunchtime, and Joop didn't fall off once.
Following on from his fine example, I started the front myself, but found it difficult to get straight parallel rows of tiles, as nothing else on the roof was square. Joop came over to get me started, and finally I was ready to finish.
I managed to lay the rest of the tiles on my own, with Tina doing all the lifting.
Above - Suris Historical Society Re-enacts the Strangeways Riots
That's me on the roof, cementing down the ridge tiles. The hardest thing about being up there, apart from trying not to look down, was getting back on the ladder to get down again. Sitting up there was also a good way to spot a big dip in the gutter that I had replaced a few weeks before.
It all looks good now it is finished, and it has survived the winter and some big storms.
Joop's help was invaluable, and last week I was able to repay the favour as he needed some help stripping one of his roofs.
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