What Type Of Roof Is Better?

[kooky 2]

No. But in the initial stage, my contractor has given me a quote on Zinc roofing but then he just informed use that he will replace this material with tile roofing. As my husband travels out every 2 weeks, we have yet to find out from the contractor why the change. My guess is the cost but yet to be confirmed.

[jjbinks 0]

No. But in the initial stage, my contractor has given me a quote on Zinc roofing but then he just informed use that he will replace this material with tile roofing. As my husband travels out every 2 weeks, we have yet to find out from the contractor why the change. My guess is the cost but yet to be confirmed.

Thx. So you're guessing which is more expensive, metal or tile?

Edited January 28, 2013 by jjbinks

[kooky 2]

I would have thought that the cost can be almost comparable; depending on the country of origin where the tiles are made?

I am not an expert in construction field; purely my assumption.

[jjbinks 0]

Yes, thx. Quality is key, I'm hoping that someone who has installed Lysaght would be able to comment about the noise from rain with the 6 layers of insulation. May just fall back to tiles to be safe.

[pantieileen 2]

Yes, thx. Quality is key, I'm hoping that someone who has installed Lysaght would be able to comment about the noise from rain with the 6 layers of insulation. May just fall back to tiles to be safe.

i'm on lysaght. confirm no noise. in fact when it was raining so heavily in the past few months at night, we don't even know. Maybe we are heavy sleepers. In most instance, we never heard the rain and didn't wake up to close the balcony sliding door so water came in.

Can hear noise of water dripping if i never close the bathroom windows though.

[yoongf 11]

Lysight is like the industry branded stuff. If u mention 6 layers.. means contractor is strictly following the manufacturer recommendations. If strict compliance.. this will be way more costly than tile roof.

I have used both before.. and personally I think metal roof is better. I went for tile roof as it matches with the surrounding neighbourhood (Katong area). But tile roof has its limitations. During heavy rain with strong wind that blows water upslopes, it leaks! Tile roof is also not suitable if there is insufficient gradient. and somehow.. I find that tile roof is hotter, acts like a hot stone at nite.

Metal roof creaks under hot sun! but the termination ensures no leaks. Sound wise. tile quieter.

So.. if me going to redo another house.. it will be metal roof again.

[pantieileen 2]

My current house used to be using zinc roof since the day it was built, whole stretch by my granduncle, we call them the Malaysia kampung style houses now. Based on my memory, should be 1m x 50cm kind wavy kind. Some are metal some are transparent as seen from my old neighbors (original never rebuilt). Transparent for light. These kind will leak and i believe their lifespan is about 30-50yr old since this entire stretch was built in the 1960s. When it rains, you literally CANNOT hear one another talk. There's no such thing as insulation in the old times and when its bloody hot in the afternoon, you can feel the heat. Esp so when it's in the backyard so no such thing as false ceiling. When it leaks, well, my late grandparents will put a pail underneath until my uncles or father got time to climb up the put a brick to cover the leak.

So my parents house in the Changi area built around 1990 & 2000 when terrace or semiD houses in angmo style, more like European pattern are the "in" thing are on tiles. Tiles u need timber support and tiles comes in european, malaysian and japanese. Glazed or unglazed. Glazed nicer lah, got mould cannot see the black black stuff. Jap abit more expensive than Malaysia but still not as nice.

Underneath the tiles, some contractors will put false ceiling, depending on location you install sometimes like front patio or kitchen no insulation, mostly is again false ceiling. so during rain, you can hear the rain but it's louder more like playing bass. Honestly, u cannot hear the person on the line if you are talking on the phone. Based on my memory coz i stayed on 3rd floor, the insulation = false ceiling is not bad, cannot hear the rain. Well i peek before when the termite guys come to check the ceiling and climb up, i see silver silver stuff i don't see the naked tiles so i'm assuming got some kind of insulation above the false ceiling. I didn't feel the heat since my room had a very high ceiling and most of the time on aircon so never noticed.

Now my new house, i removed the zinc roof where my grnadparents used to lived, and use lysight. Simply because i did reconstruction and needed to use the old pillars and beams so i needed to reduce the weight and opt for light weight ceilings. Besides, i checked with family who built factories in tuas and felt the insulation was ok. I'm now staying on the 3rd floor with 4m ceiling.

Metal roof i'm assuming you mean lysaght brand or etc are also available curve but i did mine angled.

Contractors these days don't do their own roof installations. They will employ roof specialist to install it. The same roof contractor who did my house was a nice uncle, he climbed up my condo roof (top floor) after my tenant kpkb raining leak and helped me to prove to stupid management that the entire estate roof lifespan is up (tile pitched roof builts in 1990s), need to change roof. Never charge me single cent so he knows his stuff.

Edited January 29, 2013 by pantieileen

[jjbinks 0]

Wow, thanks pantieileen,yoongf. This is exactly the type of feedback I'm looking for, appreciate it. Yes, the contractor has recommended Lysaght with the 6 layer insulation. My initial concern was the it would be noisy when raining but he said that he has built a few houses using this and there were no complaints of noise due to the insulation. It seems Lysaght can come in various forms, curved or angled and some finishes can even look like tiles.

[shhh201 0]

does anyone have any experience in a reinforced concrete roof? How is it compared to a galvanised metal roofing? 

Thank you for any inputs!

[snoozee 97]

23 minutes ago, shhh201 said:

does anyone have any experience in a reinforced concrete roof? How is it compared to a galvanised metal roofing? 

Thank you for any inputs!

with RC roof you will need to do proper waterproofing before the final screed layer is applied. concrete itself is porous so water can seep through if water proofing is not done properly. also RC roof would be heavier than other roofing options so you may incur addition cost for your entire building if you want a RC roof.

honestly, no point doing RC roof unless you  are building a roof terrace for entertainment usage.