Ridge Capping Repairs
Ridge Capping – Repairs and Maintenance
The ridge caps on your roof are the most important factor in keeping the weather out and securing the tiles where they meet on adjacent roof panels. Recent improvements in Ridge Capping Repair technology mean a far longer life for your restored ridge capping. When your roof is inspected it will be assessed for degradation of the mortar and a repair option will be advised, ranging from stripping the capping and relaying, to cleaning the surface and re-pointing the mortar with flexible acrylic bonding agents.
Great Examples of Ridge
The condition of your roof is affected by many factors, including its location, age and the quality of its initial installation. It’s important to have someone experienced to determine the best course of action for Ridge Capping Repairs, as unsuitable Ridge Capping Repair work is very difficult and expensive to reverse. Always ensure anyone making this judgement is a licensed roof contractor. From our experience around 95% of ridge capping over 20 years old will need to be re-bedded, but we have found many examples of ridge capping over 50 years old still in good condition.
The Re-Bedding Process
This 40-year-old ridge has been bedded and pointed in a sand and cement mortar mix. The caps appear to be solid but can be easily lifted by extreme weather. This is typical of the condition of unmaintained ridge capping of this age.
In this image, the ridge caps and roof have been pressure cleaned. Although not essential to the process, occasionally we require the roof to be cleaned to ensure a stable and safe work surface. From our experience, less than 10 per cent of jobs requires this process.
The ridge caps are removed, and all the old mortar is stripped off. At this point, the tiles surrounding the ridges are checked for cracks or defects and replaced if necessary. Any broken wooden battens are replaced and any lead flashings checked for wear.
With the old mortar gone, all that’s left is a few decades worth of dust, mould and debris. Unbelievably, it’s quite common to see contractors either relay their mortar straight onto this layer or to simply blow off the bulk of it with a garden blower.
We know perfect preparation is the key to a capping job that will last decades, so we carefully clean the affected areas with high-pressure water to ensure a completely clean surface to maximize adhesion.
The new mortar bed is laid. Special frames are used to ensure the ridge caps will go back on perfectly straight and level. We only used pre-mixed bag mortar to ensure a consistent quality mix every time.
Once the ridge caps are re-bedded, weep holes are inserted before the ridge caps can be repointed. If moisture ever makes its way into your top ridges it will have somewhere to drain instead of causing damage inside of your roof. The collar or overlap on the join on each cap is pointed/sealed with roof bond to ensure a watertight seal on each cap.
Once mortar has dried the ridge caps are ready to point, roof bond pointing mix is preferred to be used, it is an acrylic premium compound, and can match any roof colour. Once cured, it allows the ridge caps to flex with any movement in the roof structure, and prevent cracking and separation.
The Re-Pointing Process
The existing pointing is thoroughly cleaned using high-pressure water to remove any loose debris or contaminants which could compromise the quality of the pointing process, any broken or damaged tile surrounding the ridge caps are removed or repaired.
The ridge caps are repointed using a high strength acrylic mix. This product is available in a wide variety of pre-mixed colours. Once fully cured the ridge caps bond firmly to the roof, whilst still allowing them to flex with the movement of the roof without cracking or separating.
We are so confident in our ability to determine the suitability of your roof for repointing, that we offer the same 10-year warranty that our full re-bed jobs are issued.
