Chimney Repairs · Warlingham CR6
Chimney Repairs In Warlingham
Is one of your Warlingham chimneys taking the weather harder than the rest?
Repointing, flaunching, lead work and rebuilds for cottage stacks and the tall chimneys on Warlingham's larger houses
A big Warlingham house rarely has just one chimney. The generous interwar and postwar detached homes out along Limpsfield Road, round Hamsey Green and on towards Chelsham and Farleigh often carry two or three stacks, each one sticking up through a roof full of hips and valleys. On the south and east sides there is open field, so nothing breaks the wind before it reaches them. Rain arrives at an angle, soaks one face of the brickwork and gets driven under the lead where the stack meets the tiles. Around Warlingham Green the stacks on the older cottages have a different problem: age, softer mortar and years of earlier patching. Whichever kind you have, the damp in the bedroom usually starts at the top of the stack or at its flashings.
Chimney Repairs quote in Warlingham
Four details and somebody will come and look at it. There is no charge for the visit, no obligation afterwards, and if the answer is that your roof is fine, that is what you will be told.
The people behind it
John and Mark, and how your chimney gets decided
When a house has two or three stacks, choosing which to tackle now is a judgement call. The two brothers who own Roof Repairs Croydon, John and Mark, trust each other's view, so those calls get made quickly rather than going back and forth.
They have always worked together without a falling-out, and they reckon they are at their best as a pair. Customers often tell them that dealing with the pair of them is refreshing. The brothers like to think, with a smile, that having two of them makes the firm twice as good as a typical roofer.
1,000+
Roofs put right
10 year
Written workmanship guarantee
£0
To have somebody come and look
Repair first
Replacement is the last resort
Signs a Warlingham chimney needs attention
You can spot most of these from the garden with a pair of binoculars. Each one points somewhere fairly specific.
Damp on the chimney breast that gets worse after a windy downpour
Rain is being forced into the stack on its exposed side. On a house facing open ground it is often the weather face of the brickwork soaking up water, or lead flashings that have lifted enough for wind to blow rain behind them.
Mortar missing from the joints near the top
The highest courses get the most weather and dry out the least. Once the pointing erodes, water goes straight into the brick and down the inside of the stack.
Cracks in the cement round the pots
That is the flaunching, the mortar cap the pots sit in. When it cracks, water drops into the stack from above. On an exposed roof a loose pot can also become a hazard.
Lead at the base of the stack sitting proud of the tiles
The flashing has worked loose from its joint in the brickwork, or was held with mortar or mastic that has since cracked. Driven rain gets in under it.
Why Warlingham chimneys get a careful survey from us
All of the stacks, not just one
If one chimney is leaking, the others on the same roof have had the same weather. We check each of them, so you know what is coming before scaffold goes up.
Lime where the house calls for it
Older cottages near the Green were built with soft mortar. Repointing them in hard cement traps water in the brick. We match the mix to the age of the stack.
Flashings dressed and wedged
Lead is cut and shaped on site, tucked into the mortar joint and wedged. A fillet of mortar or a bead of mastic does not survive long against wind-driven rain.
Pots made secure
Cracked flaunching is renewed and shaped to throw water off. A pot rocking in its bed on a high, open roof is not something to leave until spring.
Access planned on the first visit
Tall stacks on large, complicated roofs usually need scaffold. We plan where it goes during the survey, so the price you get already includes it.
Ten years in writing
Our workmanship guarantee covers the chimney work we do, and you receive it in writing when the job is signed off.
What open ground does to a Warlingham chimney
A chimney is brickwork exposed on all four sides with almost nothing to protect it at the top. On a house in a dense street, neighbouring roofs give it some shelter. In Warlingham, with long open fields to the south and east, a stack on a tall detached house can stand completely clear of anything that would slow the wind. The result is that one or two faces of the chimney get soaked far more than the others, and rain gets pushed into joints and under lead that would stay dry on a sheltered roof.
The size of the houses matters too. A big roof with hips, valleys and dormers often places a stack low on a slope or right beside a valley, so the base of the chimney has a lot of water running past it. The back gutter behind the stack and the stepped flashings down its sides have to deal with all of that. Meanwhile the cottages around the Green bring older brickwork, softer mortar and repairs from several decades ago, some of them done with materials that now do more harm than good.
"On Warlingham stacks we often find one face badly weathered and the opposite face in decent order, which tells you plainly which direction the rain comes from."
From chimney repairs enquiries in Warlingham handled by Roof Repairs Croydon
How we repair a chimney in Warlingham
A photo and a description
Send a zoomed picture of the stack and tell us where the damp shows indoors. Saying whether it gets worse in windy weather is especially useful.
The free survey
We look at every chimney on the roof, check pointing, flaunching, pots and lead, then go into the loft to see if the stack is wet on the inside.
Working out the extent
Weathered brick faces can look worse than they are. We find out how far down any damage goes before suggesting anything larger than a repair.
Your written quote
Scaffold, repointing, flaunching and lead are each listed. If more than one stack needs work, you can see the cost of each and decide what to do now.
The chimney work
Joints are raked out and repointed in a suitable mix, pots rebedded in fresh flaunching, and new lead flashings dressed into the brickwork and wedged.
Photos and the guarantee
Once it is finished we photograph the stack from the scaffold, so you can see work you would never see from the ground, then hand over the ten year guarantee.
The 10 year guarantee, and why it is safe to offer
Promising a roof will stay dry is easy. What counts is what happens if it does not. Work booked through Roof Repairs Croydon carries a 10 year workmanship guarantee, on paper, handed to you on the day and written in language you can actually read. The slates, tiles, lead, mortar, membranes and rainwater goods carry their own manufacturer cover on top of that. It varies by product, so you get told which cover applies to your job rather than one headline number that would be wrong on most of them.
Here is the reason a guarantee like that is not a risk. Repairs come back for one reason above all others: the fault was never found in the first place. Somebody went up, saw a stain on the ceiling below, mended whatever looked worst directly above it, and left. Water does not cooperate with that approach. It lands on a slate, runs under it, drops onto a rafter and travels along the rafter before it finds anywhere to fall. On a wide hipped roof in Sanderstead or Shirley that can be five metres from where it came in.
Find the entry point and the repair holds for years. Miss it and no amount of guarantee wording helps anybody. That is why the survey happens before the price, and it is why, if the same water finds its way back into your house inside the guarantee period, putting it right costs you nothing.
10 year
Workmanship guarantee
1,000+
Roofs put right
Covered
Public liability insurance
Per product
Maker's own warranty
Points to check in any Warlingham chimney quote
Does it say which mortar?
For an older cottage stack, the quote should mention lime. For an interwar or postwar stack, the mix should still be chosen to suit the brick, not simply the hardest cement available.
Is the flaunching included?
The top of the stack is where water most often gets in. If the quote covers pointing but says nothing about the pots and the flaunching, you may be paying for scaffold twice.
How is the lead fixed?
Look for code 4 lead set into the joints and wedged. If the quote says the flashing will be sealed with mastic, expect it to fail sooner on a roof this exposed.
Repair the stack or take it down?
Some Warlingham chimneys no longer serve a fire. Keeping one in good order and taking it out are both sensible choices. This is how they usually compare.
| Comparison point | Repair and keep | Remove below roof |
|---|---|---|
| Suits | Working flues or a stack you like | Redundant flues you never use |
| Upkeep | Pointing and lead every few decades | None once the roof is closed |
| Inside work | None | Flue capped and vented |
| Roof work | Flashings renewed | Gap tiled to match |
| Cost | Usually lower | Higher, but a one-off |
| Council check | Not usually needed | Worth asking Tandridge first |
Flat roofs below the chimney
Plenty of extended houses here have a flat roof or a dormer sitting close to a stack, and the two can be confused when water comes through a ceiling. If you are not sure which is at fault, read about our flat roof repairs in Warlingham, or we can check both on the same visit.
What a Warlingham chimney repair costs
Repointing one short stack and rebuilding the top of a tall one are very different jobs. These are the things that make the most difference to the figure.
Height and position on the roof
A stack set high on a large detached house at Chelsham, Farleigh or along Limpsfield Road usually needs a taller scaffold than a cottage chimney near Warlingham Green. Where the roof has several hips and valleys, the scaffold may also need to bridge them.
Number of stacks
Doing two or three chimneys while one scaffold is up costs far less than doing them separately. If more than one is borderline, it is worth thinking about now.
How deep the damage goes
Weathered pointing and cracked flaunching are relatively cheap to put right. Brick that has blown right through, or a stack that has moved, means taking down to sound courses and rebuilding.
Chimney Repairs in Warlingham: questions
Do I need permission from Tandridge to take down a chimney in Warlingham?
Repairing or repointing a stack does not need permission. Removing or altering a stack you can see from the road is different, and it is worth checking with Tandridge District Council before you start, because Warlingham is in Surrey and Croydon has no say here. Warlingham is also a parished area, so the parish council is consulted if a planning application is needed. If you live near Whyteleafe, confirm which council covers your street first, as a handful of streets there fall inside the London Borough of Croydon.
Why does rain get into my chimney only when it is windy?
On open ground the wind pushes rain sideways into the brick and under the lead at the base of the stack. In still weather the same water would run straight off. It usually means the flashings have lifted or the pointing on the weather side has worn away. Note which way the wind was blowing next time, because it tells us which face to look at first.
Our Warlingham house has three chimneys. Do they all need doing?
Not necessarily. They have all faced the same weather, so it is sensible to have each one checked, but they may be in different states depending on which way they face and how they were built. We will tell you which need work now and which can wait, and what it would save to do them together while the scaffold is up.
What if our chimney is shared with the house next door?
That is less common among Warlingham's detached houses, but it does happen. Pointing and lead work on your own half is yours to arrange without asking them. Rebuilding or removing it is another matter: the Party Wall etc. Act 1996 applies, and your neighbour has to be given notice in advance.
Should an old cottage chimney near the Green be pointed in lime?
If it was built with lime mortar, yes. Soft old brick and lime work together, letting moisture dry out through the joints. Hard cement pointing stops that, holds water in the brick and can make the faces flake off after a few frosts. We match the mortar to what the stack was built with.
What Croydon homeowners say
From roads across the borough, once the ladders had gone.
"Damp patch on our landing ceiling for about three years. Two roofers had been out and both mended the tiles directly above it, and neither made the slightest difference. This chap spent twenty minutes in the loft with a torch before he even went outside, then showed me a photo of a split in the lead in the valley about four metres away from the stain. Fixed it in a morning. Three winters on and nothing."
"Water was coming down the front bedroom wall every time it rained hard and I had convinced myself the roof was finished. It was the gutter. Half of it had dropped so the water was sitting in the middle and going over the front rather than down the pipe. He reset the brackets and cleared the gully, charged me a fraction of what I had budgeted for, and told me the roof itself had years left. Could easily have sold me a new one."
"Ours is in the Chatsworth Road conservation area and I had no idea the rules on roof work here are stricter than the rest of Croydon. He knew straight away, explained what I could and could not do without an application, and did the repair in matching slate. That saved me a very awkward conversation with the council later on."
"Lost most of the ridge tiles along the back in a February gale. Rang in the morning, sheeted the same afternoon so the weather could not get in, came back the following week when it was dry and rebedded the whole ridge properly. Sent me photos of everything for the insurance without me even asking. The bill was exactly what the quote said it would be."
"Gutters had been overflowing under the trees for years and the fascia behind them had gone soft. What I appreciated was that he explained why the timber had rotted rather than just quoting to replace it, and pointed out the new soffits needed vents or I would end up with condensation in the loft instead. Nobody had ever mentioned that to me before."
Had us out to your roof?
Two minutes writing a review does more for a small local firm than any amount of advertising, and it helps the next person in Croydon work out who to ring.
Things to do in Warlingham
Three places close by that are worth a visit once the scaffold comes down.
Warlingham Green
The village's triangular green, lined with trees and surrounded by the war memorial, shops and cafes. The May Queen is crowned here every year.
View on Google Maps - Warlingham Green
All Saints Church
This flint church goes back to roughly 1250, and George Gilbert Scott restored it in 1857. Local tradition connects it with Archbishop Cranmer's first Book of Common Prayer.
View on Google Maps - All Saints Church
Blanchman's Farm Local Nature Reserve
A 23-acre nature reserve a short walk east of the Green, with woodland, meadows, a pond and a community orchard. Its nature trail suits wheelchairs and pushchairs.
View on Google Maps - Blanchman's Farm Local Nature ReserveWarlingham on the map
We are about 14 minutes away in South Croydon. Warlingham comes under Tandridge District Council in Surrey, so any chimney question for the planning team goes there.
Areas we cover
We repair chimneys in Warlingham and in each of the towns listed below, on both sides of the Surrey border.
Chimney Repairs by town
Damp near a chimney in Warlingham?
Send us a photo of the stack or give us a ring. We will come out free from South Croydon, look at every chimney on the roof and give you a fixed written price for what actually needs doing.