Do-it-yourself roof repair from a soft roof

The soft roof is quite easy to install and is available to the vast majority of developers, which is why it remains very popular for many years. Unfortunately, nothing lasts forever, and often breakdowns happen to any objects and mechanisms that surround us, and the roof cladding is no exception. Repair of a soft roof happens quite often, and the owners of the house have to fix it, sometimes even a couple of times a year people eliminate the defects that have appeared. The only good news is that for such work it is not necessary to involve masters, because the entire restoration process can be done by hand.

The renovation plan is usually drawn up after a thorough revision of the roof, which allows you to identify any problems that have arisen. There are two standard ways to repair roofing:

• overhaul of the soft roof;
• ongoing elimination of defects.

Each of these methods is performed according to a separate technology, within which it is recommended to use different materials, and if urgently needed, you can take up work even in winter.

The main reason for the frequent wear and tear of roofing material lies in the properties of bitumen, which is exposed to sunlight and begins to melt at high temperatures., hence the defects, expressed by swellings and irregularities, affecting the further operation of the structure. The thing is that when precipitation falls in the formed depressions, rainwater or melt snow accumulates, seeping through cracks in the bitumen. But in winter, you can face some problems, because during a thaw, the snow melts, and with a sharp drop in temperature, it turns into ice, which expands cracks in the material and tears it.

To determine if the sheathing needs to be repaired, carefully examine the roof surface. If in some places the waterproofing has peeled off, cracks have appeared, bitumen has swollen, or depressions or moss have sprouted, repair of the soft roof is inevitable. If the defects are minor, you can easily get by with a small repair and can easily cope with it yourself.

Let's make a reservation right away that major repairs can be made not so expensive if a preventive process is performed every three years. As for the current repair, it provides for minimal lining errors, and you will not need to dismantle old roll materials with dried mastic, which, in fact, require repair. This will require updating the existing layer, namely:

• elimination of bubbles;
• replacement of funnels for water drainage;
• replacement of parapet coverings or eaves;
• covering the old layer with primers;
• fusing of new waterproofing.

Experienced craftsmen advise paying special attention to the most problematic places, which are the joints of roofing elements, parapet structures and walls, as well as those areas where gutters are fixed. In some cases, you can limit yourself to patches, but they often do not give a stable result and do not guarantee the continued operation of the roof without leaks.

The principle of chiseled repair of a soft roof

Soft roof repair technology consists of several stages, namely:

1. Cleaning the surface from debris, dirt and moss;
2. Examination of the surface for the presence of rot, and if found, such segments should be cut off with the capture of intact material (up to 2 cm on each side);
3. Leveling irregularities with special mastic, which will require mortar materials such as a cement composition;
4. Cutting off all bubbles, removing dust, drying the surface and leveling it to firmly fix the patch;
5. A patch is cut out of a new material with a 5 cm allowance;
6. Lubrication of the surface with mastic and gluing of patches.

We draw your attention to the fact that on the reverse side, the patch must be treated with bitumen mastic. Further in the work, you will need a torch, which needs to warm up the patch, after which it is pressed with a press.

In professional circles, such an expression is known as "old repair", which means that it is not necessary to dismantle old roofing materials, and defects are eliminated on top of them. This method is much cheaper and easier to implement than overhaul of a soft roof. It can be easily done with your own hands, therefore, this method is used most often.

Laying new layers on top of old ones

In this case, old roofing materials, on which defects have been identified, will serve as the basis for a new coating. The finishing coating can be applied in one or two layers - it all depends on the scale of the disaster and on the financial capabilities of the owner of the house, but a double carpet, of course, is better and more reliable, since its strength is higher. However, one cannot fail to mention that it is necessary to take into account the capabilities of the rafter system, because here the load on the roof surface increases by 5kg / 1m2 due to the roll cladding, and the mastic on which it is glued gives additional weight. Repair of a soft roll roof according to this principle is suitable for a roof that is not in a completely deplorable state. If the old roll lining is completely bad, the risk will be unjustified, and it is better to immediately set up for a major repair. Also, this method should be abandoned if the previously laid layers of bitumen exceed the permissible rate (maximum 6 - 8 layers), again due to the severity of the materials.

If you carried out an audit and found that a significant area of ​​the roof has suffered, and defects reach 60% of the entire surface, patching and mastic will not work here. In this case, only a complete dismantling of the dilapidated damaged cladding and the laying of soft material in a new way can help to correct the situation. As a rule, major repairs are resorted to in the event of regular and abundant roof leaks, as a result of which the insulation is damaged and loses its properties or the sheathing freezes.

Rules for laying a soft roof

The minimum set of work on the overhaul of the roof can be attributed to the dismantling of bitumen and its replacement with new material lubricated with mastic, replacement of funnels and cornices, drying of the insulation using special devices, replacement of the parapet structure. If the condition of the roof is more than deplorable, and the defects have touched the rafter system, it will be necessary to update not only the cladding, but also the frame with vapor barrier and insulation, and the order of work will be as follows:

1. We dismantle old materials;
2. We eliminate screed defects;
3. We carry out the entire roofing process in a new way.

It is better to do overhaul of a soft roof with your own hands with assistants, because here you will have to tinker with not only bitumen and mastic, but you will also need to install some roof elements that are difficult to lift alone, let alone fix.

This video shows in detail the entire process of installing the roof. After viewing, you will be able to do all the work yourself.