Skylight Installation in Martlesham
- Fixed quote before we start
- Roof never left open overnight
- 10-year workmanship guarantee
- Fixed quote before we start
- 10 years workmanship guarantee
- 25 years fitting rooflights
- Skylights only, not a general roofer
Martlesham was planned, not accumulated. It grew from the 1970s onward in defined phases, with continuing new build alongside it driven partly by employment at Adastral Park, and that shows in the roofs. Walk one phase and you see the same handful of house types repeating, same pitch, same covering, same span, same construction. The next phase changes type and then repeats just as consistently. Most Suffolk villages give us a different roof at every address. This one does not.
It sits about 5.8 miles north-east of Ipswich in a straight line, a straightforward run up the A12. Call it twenty minutes outside the peak.
When the roofs repeat, the quoting gets sharper
Once we have surveyed one roof of a given type here, we know what the next one of that type needs. Rafter or truss spacing, batten gauge, covering, membrane, where the services run in the loft. The survey is quicker, the material list is right first time, and we can schedule tightly because we are not finding surprises on the morning of the fit.
It cuts both ways. First-generation rooflights across a phase went in at roughly the same time, so they reach end of life at roughly the same time. When one house has a unit misting up, neighbours with the same original units are usually a year or two behind. That is how a batch of sealed units ages.
We still survey every roof. Same house type does not mean same roof, because loft conversions, re-coverings and solar panels vary house to house. The quote is fixed after survey, not before.
Breathable membrane changes the detail at the opening
This is where most of the leaks we get called to on newer stock come from.
Older roofs were built with bitumen sarking felt under the battens. Heavy, impermeable, sagging into a drape between rafters that carried water to the eaves. Modern roofs use a breathable membrane instead, laid taut rather than draped.
At a rooflight opening that membrane has to be cut, and what happens next decides whether the roof leaks. It must be cut back cleanly, dressed and supported into the unit’s underfelt collar, and lapped so water running down its face is delivered onto the outside of the flashing. Get the lap the wrong way round, or leave the membrane sagging below the collar, and water tracks behind the flashing instead of over it.
That leak is hard to find because it only appears in specific conditions. In ordinary rain, water runs down the tiles and off the flashing and almost nothing reaches the membrane. In driving rain with wind on that elevation, water gets under the tiles, arrives on the membrane and follows it to the failed lap. So it leaks perhaps four times a winter, and every dry-day inspection finds nothing.
If your newer house leaks only in driving rain and never in ordinary rain, look at the membrane detail at the opening, not at the glass. The unit is usually fine. The lap behind it is not.
Part L, and what a U-value swap actually feels like
Plenty of the units on the older phases here are original or first-replacement, so early 2000s or thereabouts. A roof window of that generation runs at roughly 2.8 W/m²K across the whole unit. A current one, with a warm-edge spacer, argon fill, a low-emissivity coating and a thermally broken frame, is around 1.2.
That is less than half the heat loss through the same hole in the roof. In a loft bedroom in January it is the most noticeable single upgrade we do. The cold downdraught off the glass stops, morning condensation on the pane largely goes with it, and the room holds temperature overnight. People notice the draught going long before they notice a bill.
| Generation of unit | Typical whole-unit U-value | What you feel |
|---|---|---|
| Early 2000s double glazed | around 2.8 W/m²K | Cold radiating off the glass, morning condensation, room cools fast overnight |
| Current double glazed, warm-edge spacer | around 1.2 W/m²K | No downdraught, dry pane most mornings, room holds heat |
| Current triple glazed | below 1.0 W/m²K | Marginal further gain, heavier unit, worth it on large north-facing openings |
Replacement is the only route we offer on a failed unit. A reseal on a blown early-2000s rooflight leaves you with an early-2000s U-value and a repair that buys a season.
Shallow-pitch garages and outriggers want a flat unit, not a roof window
Estate stock of this era throws up a lot of low-pitch roofs on secondary structures. Garages, single-storey outriggers, utility and porch roofs, often well below the pitch a roof window is designed for. Most roof windows have a minimum pitch, commonly around 15 degrees, with a flashing kit that relies on gravity doing the work.
Put a roof window on a 10-degree roof and the flashing is holding back water that is barely running. The answer is a flat rooflight on a built kerb. We form a timber kerb at least 150mm above the finished surface, weather the covering up its face, and set a flat unit on top with its own fall in the frame. If the garage roof is due a re-covering, that is the moment, because the kerb goes in with the new covering rather than being cut into a finished roof.
Adastral Park keeps the newest phases coming
Martlesham is not a finished village. Employment at Adastral Park has kept new housing coming forward on the edges for years, and each phase was built to the standard of its day. The very newest roofs here are tighter, better insulated and more likely to carry solar than the 1970s and 1980s stock at the core. That cuts both ways for a rooflight. On the newest houses the roof is airtight and the Part L baseline is already high, so a new opening has to be detailed carefully or it becomes the weak point in an otherwise efficient envelope. On the older phases the units fitted at build are the weak point, and replacing them is the single upgrade that changes a room most. Knowing which phase you are in tells us which of those two jobs we are quoting before we are on the roof.
The whole street ages at once, and that is useful
Because the estate was built in defined runs, the original rooflights across a phase went in within months of each other, so they reach the end of their sealed-unit life within a season or two of each other as well. When one house has a unit misting up, the neighbours with the same original windows are usually not far behind. That is not a sales line, it is simply how a batch of sealed units ages, and it has a practical upside. When we are already fitting on a street we can survey and quote for neighbours in the same visit, block the scaffold and the crew efficiently, and pass the saving on. If a few houses on the same run coordinate, the cost of getting a crew out drops for all of them.
Which of our services this estate stock actually needs
- VELUX window installation for loft rooms and first-floor bedrooms, where a named roof window is usually what the original build specified and what a replacement has to match on size.
- Energy efficient skylight installation for the U-value upgrade on original units, the job that changes a bedroom most.
- Flat roof skylight installation for shallow-pitch garage and outrigger roofs, on a properly built kerb.
- Pitched roof skylight installation for new openings in the main roof, where the membrane detail has to be right.
Nearby we work in Kesgrave, Woodbridge and Waldringfield. The rest is on areas we cover.
Book a survey up the A12
Send the house type, the age if you know it, and a photograph of the existing unit or the roof slope. We survey, quote once, and the figure holds unless the specification changes. Installed to current Building Regulations with a 10-year workmanship guarantee. Request a fixed quote.
My neighbour has the same house type. Can you quote from theirs?
It gets us very close. On a planned development the roof construction repeats reliably within a phase, so we can give you a realistic figure before anyone comes out. We still survey your roof, because loft conversions, re-coverings, solar panels and earlier rooflight work vary house to house and any of them can change the price. The quote is fixed after survey, not before.
Why does my newer house only leak in driving rain?
Almost always the membrane detail at the opening rather than the rooflight itself. Modern roofs use a breathable membrane under the battens, and at a rooflight it has to be cut, supported and lapped so water running down it lands outside the flashing. If that lap is wrong, ordinary rain never reaches it. Wind-driven rain pushes water under the tiles onto the membrane, it finds the fault, and it tracks behind the flashing.
Can you put a roof window in my garage roof?
Not a pitched roof window, if the pitch is as shallow as most garage and outrigger roofs on these estates. Roof windows generally have a minimum pitch around 15 degrees and their flashing relies on water moving. Below that we build a timber kerb at least 150mm above the finished surface, dress the covering up it, and fit a flat rooflight with its own fall. Best done at the same time as a re-covering if one is due.
Do we get a discount if a few of us on the street book together?
It can work in your favour, yes. Because the estate was built in runs, houses of the same type reach the end of their sealed-unit life around the same time, so neighbours are often thinking about the same job within a season of each other. When we are already on a street we can survey and quote several houses in one visit and block the scaffold and crew efficiently, which brings the cost of getting us out down for everyone involved. Each roof is still surveyed and priced on its own, because conversions, re-coverings and solar vary house to house.
My house is on one of the newest Martlesham phases. Does the tighter build change anything?
It changes the detailing rather than the possibility. The newest roofs are airtight and already well up to the Part L standard, so a new opening has to be sealed and insulated carefully at the reveal or it becomes the weak point in an efficient roof. The membrane lap at the opening matters just as much. None of that is difficult, it just has to be done properly, which is the whole argument for a specialist rather than a general builder on a modern airtight roof.
Can you match the flashing to my estate roof’s tiles?
Yes, and it is essential rather than optional. The concrete interlocking tiles common on these estates have a deep profile, so the flashing kit has to be the profiled version that dresses down into the roll of the tile. A plain-tile kit leaves a gap under the side flashing that no sealant closes for long, and it is one of the most common reasons a rooflight fitted by a general builder starts weeping a couple of winters later. We identify the exact covering at survey and order the kit to match it with the window, which on a re-covered or solar-panelled roof is not always what the front elevation would suggest. Get it wrong and the leak arrives in driving rain a couple of winters on rather than on the day, which is what makes that kind of fault so hard to trace.
Thinking about this job? We survey across Ipswich, Suffolk and north Essex and give you a fixed price before any work starts, with a 10-year workmanship guarantee.