Emergency Roofing
Emergency Tile Roof Repairs in Sydney
The tiled-roof specifics, from slipped tiles to crumbling pointing.
Tile roofs fail in ways metal roofs never do, and they need a roofer who knows the difference. Terracotta and concrete tiles crack under foot traffic and hail, slip when the batten or clip lets go, and rely on bedding and pointing mortar that perishes over decades. When one of those fails in a storm, water gets straight onto the underlay and into your home. We carry common Sydney tile profiles so most emergency tile repairs are done on the spot.
How tiles actually fail
A tile roof sheds water by overlap, so a single displaced tile breaks the whole system locally. Tiles crack from hail or someone walking the roof carelessly, slip when a clip corrodes or a batten rots, and the ridge and hip lines fail when the bedding mortar crumbles and lets the capping shift. Wind then lifts loosened tiles and drives rain under the courses.
Terracotta and concrete behave differently too. Terracotta is brittle and can shatter, while concrete tiles delaminate and go porous with age, so the right fix depends on which you have.
Re-bedding and re-pointing after a failure
When ridge or hip capping lets go in a storm, replacing a tile is not enough, the mortar bed underneath has usually failed. We re-bed the capping on fresh mortar and re-point with a flexible pointing compound that moves with the roof instead of cracking straight out again like old rigid mortar does.
Doing this in an emergency needs dry conditions to cure, so occasionally we secure the capping temporarily and return to re-point once the weather clears.
Matching old and discontinued tiles
Sydney has tile profiles going back decades, and not every one is still made. We stock the common terracotta and concrete profiles for immediate repairs, and for rarer or discontinued tiles we source a match or use salvaged tiles so the repair blends in rather than standing out as an obvious patch.
What's Included
- Replacement of cracked, shattered or slipped tiles
- Matching of common terracotta and concrete profiles from stock
- Re-bedding of ridge and hip capping on fresh mortar
- Re-pointing with flexible compound that resists cracking
- Repair or replacement of failed valleys and sarking where exposed
- Sourcing of matches for rare or discontinued tile profiles
Frequently Asked Questions
A few tiles cracked in the hail, is that urgent?
Yes, more than it looks. Cracked tiles expose the underlay, and wind-driven rain gets straight in from there. Cracks also spread, and the tiles around a break are often weakened too. Replacing them promptly keeps a quick repair from becoming a soaked ceiling after the next downpour.
My ridge capping is loose after a storm, can you just re-cement it?
We do better than that. Loose capping usually means the mortar bed has failed, so we re-bed it on fresh mortar and re-point with a flexible compound that flexes with the roof. Just smearing new cement over old crumbling mortar is a patch that cracks out again within a season.
What if my tiles are old and no longer made?
Common Sydney profiles we carry on the van. For discontinued or rare tiles we source a match or use salvaged tiles so the repair blends in. If a large area of an obsolete tile is damaged, we will talk through whether spot repairs or a section replacement makes more sense.
Why not just seal the cracked tile instead of replacing it?
Sealants over a cracked tile are a short-lived fix that fails in UV and thermal movement, and they look poor. Replacing the tile restores the roof's designed water-shedding overlap properly. Since we carry matching stock, a proper replacement is usually just as fast as a botched seal.
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