Can an old tile roof be repaired rather than replaced?

Usually, and in Muthaiga it is normally the right answer. Clay and concrete tiles themselves last a very long time; what fails is the bedding, the pointing, the flashings and the battens underneath. Replacing a sound tile roof with sheet changes the character of the house and is rarely cheaper once the strip-out is priced.

Do you work on original roof timbers?

Yes, and this is the part of the job we care most about. Muthaiga roofs are framed in timber, and the framing is usually worth saving. Splicing a sound repair into an existing rafter or purlin is carpentry, and our lead carpenter has been doing it for forty-three years.

Roofing & Carpentry in Muthaiga, Nairobi

We cover Muthaiga including Muthaiga, Muthaiga North, Mathenge Drive, Kitisuru border, Limuru Road, Thigiri, Nyari. Off Limuru Road and Mathenge Drive. Large plots with long driveways, generally good vehicle access, though gate widths and tree cover decide where a lorry can turn.

What is different about roofing and carpentry in Muthaiga

Muthaiga has the oldest housing stock we work on, much of it tiled with generous overhanging eaves that protect the walls and complicate the guttering.
Original Muthaiga roof structures are timber rather than steel, so roof work here is genuinely carpentry and the framing is usually worth repairing rather than replacing.
Deep eaves on Muthaiga houses put the gutter well away from the wall, so ladder work and bracket fixing are different from a modern flush eaves detail.

The oldest roofs we work on

Muthaiga has the oldest housing stock in our area, and it is roofed accordingly: clay or concrete tile, framed in timber, with deep overhanging eaves. Those roofs were built to be maintained rather than replaced, and treated that way they outlast anything going up today.

The mistake we see most often here is a tile roof being condemned when what has actually failed is the detail. Tiles themselves last decades. Bedding mortar, pointing at ridges and hips, flashings at abutments and the battens underneath do not.

Repair is usually the right answer

Replacing a Muthaiga tile roof with mabati changes the look of the house, and once you cost stripping and disposing of the old covering it is rarely the cheaper route either. So our default here is to repair: swap cracked units, re-bed and point the ridge and hip lines, renew flashings, and deal with whatever the water has been doing to the battens.

The framing is timber, which makes this carpentry

Modern Nairobi roofs are mostly framed in steel. Muthaiga roofs are framed in timber, which means roof work here is genuinely our trade rather than an adjacent one. Where a rafter end or a purlin has gone at the eaves, the right answer is usually to splice a sound repair into the existing member rather than to replace a whole length, and that is a carpentry judgement about grain, bearing and fixing.

Our lead carpenter has been making that judgement for forty-three years.

Deep eaves change the guttering

The generous overhangs that protect Muthaiga walls also put the gutter a long way out from the building. That affects bracket fixing, the ladder work, and how much a full gutter flexes between supports. Brackets spaced for a flush modern eaves are too far apart out here, and a gutter that sags then pulls its own fixings out of a fascia board that is already old.

Restoration joinery

The same houses carry original doors, frames, staircases, panelling and skirting worth keeping. Fitting new work alongside it, or repairing it, is a different skill from building new, because nothing is square and the timber species are ones nobody stocks any more. Matching a repair to existing hardwood is the most satisfying work we do and the hardest to quote from a photograph, so we look at it in person.

What we are usually called out for in Muthaiga

Roof leak repair Finding where the water actually gets in, which is rarely where the ceiling stain appears, and fixing that rather than the symptom. Re-roofing and replacement Stripping and replacing a roof, including the structure underneath when it needs it, and the point at which repairing stops being worth the money. Gutters, fascia and downpipes Guttering, downpipes, fascia and barge boards, which between them cause more roof damage when neglected than the roof covering does.

Landmarks we work around here: Muthaiga Country Club, Mathenge Drive, Limuru Road, Aga Khan Hospital.