Roof Painting - any advice

I have a terracotta coloured cement tile roof (in Perth) which is about 9 years old. I intend to get the roof painted in a charcoal or similar blackish colour to go with the rest of the house renovations I am doing. I have had some quotes from supposedly reputable and long established companies.

I have heard scary stories in the past about people getting burnt by dodgy work/products and fly-by-night companies. :eek: Hence I am a bit cautious. :(

Can anyone offer any advice in regard to:
1) Preparation, restoration and coating process
2) Products to use or avoid - sealer and colour coating etc
3) Companies you recommend or otherwise (send me a pm or email if you prefer not to bag anyone on the forum).

Any help greatly appreciated. ;) :)

Regards
Geoff

Geoff,

Try the following link for some hints. Their products are good.

www.nutechpaints.com.au/homepage.htm

Surface should be CLEAN; very important for bonding of new coatings as in any painting application; then sealer and paint/coating. Acrylic based coatings are better. Gloss coatings last longer than mat.

Regards,

Theva

ps : now, with the missing link ;)

Theva, You omitted the link
Rgds
Joe

Every roof restoration that I see looks bad after only a couple of years.

I was going to get it done too, but I wont bother now.

Al

I had mine cement roof tiles done about 10 years ago because,with age weathering off the top surface, they were no longer waterproof. I used a Melbourne company called Ceramafix P/L.

The first day they water blasted the entire roof in the morning and followed it with sand blasting during the afternoon and recemented the ridge cappings etc. The next day they sprayed on a sealing coat and two days later followed up with a final coat. We opted for a different roof colour and so far no deterioration in colour and the roof is still okay.

I don't know if we were very lucky or not, but it was done when I was still working so I took a week's holidays and watched the guy work ( I love seeing others work ;) ) and kept asking questions as to what and why he was doing. I think this helped to make sure that I got a top job.


Peter.

I saw one today in Castlemaine, just been done, all RED and shiney, but all the edges of the tiles were GREEN with moss. :( :(

Must be disapointing to pay so much and get a bodgey job.

Al

Mine are unglazed terracotta tiles. It was covered with 50 years worth of moss and took me one week to pressure clean (with hypo and caustic soda).

Gutters were replaced after that :p .

Then, got the pros to do re pointing and glazing. So far so good.

Regards,

Theva

Remember that repainting roof tiles is just that rePAINTing. They get a bit of a hiding sitting out in the heat rain and cold all day, and one must understand that any coating will break down eventually.

A good repaint is probably ok for 10 years, but with a darker colour you are likely to experience weathering and fading earlier. Probably not any worse than a light colour, just easier to see. Imagine what your car would look like if it was parked on your roof for ten years unwashed (a bit like mine I guess!) and you'll get a better idea of what is happening.
It's not rocket science, just clean, etch, repoint as necessary, then spray with a good product and go home..... which is why there are so many blithering idiots doing it!

Find a contractor in the yellow pages, ask him for addresses of places he (or she?) has done 1, 2, 5 years ago, and don't be afraid to knock on the door of one or two of them and ask the owners their opinion.

In Qld I would also do a search at the Building Services Authority to see if they had any claims lodged against them, but I don't know if that service exists in WA.

At the end of the day it's only paint, if it falls off it's not the end of the world, you can do it again!

Good luck,

P

More cautionary notes:

Black is probably the worst colour for thermal performance and ageing.

Water with all the bleach will get into roof cavity when cleaning.

The whole process should be repeated every ten years to keep the tiles looking good.

Well, if you are game then go for it.

I found the mob who did ours through another tile coating manufacturer’s web site. They have distributers in WA, chech with them for loacal tradsmen:

www.shieldcoat.com/approved.asp

Regards,

Theva

I went to a house in mansfield QLD to do an antenna one day, came down from the roof & said,"just had the roof done?"

the roof had been done 7 years ago & looked great & the finish was realy sound & seemd to shed filth prety well.

it was some sort of thick conformal coating, probably epoxy.

Icrawled on my fair share of roofs this was the best looking tile roof I had ever seen , new or old.

who did it or what it was? I dont know.

black roof..... not good..... very hot.

do a search in google for black+roof+temperature+roof+space and you will find a number of links which discuss the effect a black roof will have on your cooling bills. :eek:

From my experiences the better operators have a 95% strike rate with a good finish, with averaging around 1 in 20 roofs treated requiring re-spraying due to problems with the finish, mainly due to either color defects or poor adhesion. Thus, a hell of a lot of people get burnt when the cheapest back-yarder-non-registerd for gst unlicensed untrained tradesperson scumbag quote they accepted never returns their call to come back and re-spray under warranty. bitingmidge has summed it up pretty well.

Thanks for all the replies - much appreciated. :) Any others still welcome.

Some slightly mixed opinions - which I guess is why I asked the question in the first place, because I had heard different things.

I agree - bitingmidge has summed it up fairly well. Sturdee's point about checking the work as it progresses is also very valid.

I realize that charcoal or blackish isn't the best colour, however, colour is SWMBO's thing - and with this one there is little room for negotiation! :rolleyes: The ageing does concern me a bit but I'm not too worried about the thermal performance - yes, the roof cavity will be hotter but the ceiling is well insulated and we have ducted evaporative aircon anyway.

With the quotes I have asked for addresses of recent jobs (in a similar colour) as well as jobs 5 or more years old. All supplied recent examples but interestingly only one company supplied the older info no problem. For the others it wasn't that easy - "don't have that information available" and "we'll get back to you". :p :p I haven't knocked on any doors yet, but probably will before I lock in the final choice.

Thanks again.
Geoff :D

g'day im in the air connditioning industry in adelaide so therefor im on a roof most days of the week, so some things of note.

1. are your tiles glazed? they would need to have the glaze removed b4 repainting

2. terrecota tiles are lovely to look at but crap to work on. they break easy so have plenty of spare tiles. if you can always walk on the overlap of the tiles eg at the bottom edge of the tiles where there is a tile and a timber batten underneath.

3. having said all that i am yet to see a repainted roof that is any good after a couple of years from being done. nearly every one i look at looks ok from a distance buts a real shocker up close. tiles painted together, siliconed tiles painted over doggy pointing etc

or you could do the job yourself and then only have yourself to blame plus you wont get ripped off.

hope this helps
regards Ian

Quote:

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Originally Posted by GeoffW

I'm not too worried about the thermal performance - yes, the roof cavity will be hotter but the ceiling is well insulated and we have ducted evaporative aircon anyway.
Geoff :D

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No wonder Australia has such a bad reputation for our profligate waste of energy, production of greenhouse gases etc.

I am a little bemused that anyone would deliberately do something to their house which would make it more expensive to run. Perhaps you could suggest to your wife that the savings in air conditioning costs over the next 10 years from choosing a more sensible colour could be put towards a holiday, new car, new charcoal coloured lounge suite?