How to clear moss from a roof

[midlandslandlord]

Does anyone have any good ideas for clearing moss from a pitched roof. The situation is:

* The place is a bungalow with the eaves at about 9ft but a high ridge (~16-20ft of tile to the top measured along the surface of the roof). The pitch is around 40 degrees.

* There is about 1000sq ft of roof, and it is of 60 year old concrete (I think) tiles.

* The cleaning is a "spruce up for sale" rather than major maintenance so I don't want to do anything which will risk damaging too many tiles.

* There's a *lot* of moss built up over several years during a tenancy, so I need to do almost the whole thing. Given recent weather, now seems a good time.

I've wondered about a ladder, crawler and yard-brush, but that seems harsh. I've tried an extendable "chimney sweep" type brush which is used for cobwebs inside double height timber rooms but that is a little gentle and will do it but take a lot of time.

I'm not keen on a pressure hose as it might potentially shift tiles.

Any thoughts would be most welcome.

ML

[midlandslandlord]

Hmmm.

The yard brush works if I'm gentle.

ML

[LesleyAnne]

My mum in law had a handyman/builder chap do her bungalow roof with a pressure washer last year. Tiles now look like new. It did loosen a small piece of pointing between 2 ridge tiles and he found a cracked tile whilst he was up there, but as her house is circa 1950, and never had any roof work done since then, we thought this was pretty good. Builder said if tiles are in good order and pressure washer is set low, it shouldn't cause any damage and the loose pointing would have started to leak soon anyway, so a good job done.

[Ericthelobster]

My mum in law had a handyman/builder chap do her bungalow roof with a pressure washer last year. I can imagine you'd need to be a bit careful doing this from ground level though as there would be a strong likelihood of blasting water up under the tiles (which are intended to resist water flowing in a downwards direction!); and if you haven't got decent roofing felt below them it could be very messy...

[midlandslandlord]

My mum in law had a handyman/builder chap do her bungalow roof with a pressure washer last year. Tiles now look like new. It did loosen a small piece of pointing between 2 ridge tiles and he found a cracked tile whilst he was up there, but as her house is circa 1950, and never had any roof work done since then, we thought this was pretty good. Builder said if tiles are in good order and pressure washer is set low, it shouldn't cause any damage and the loose pointing would have started to leak soon anyway, so a good job done.

Our tiles probably aren't quite that good. They seem to be "manufactured slates".

The one to watch with this is next door's house and car, and their washing, with all the debris which can be blasted off.

A bit like spraying brown protection onto your fence in situ when next door's white cat is on the lawn, white Merc is on the drive, or grandma is in a deckchair, on the other side.

All hugely amusing if it is across the road :-), like watching a bloke with 1 foot wellies hit a 2 foot hole in the bottom of the pond.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6H3ytL0lh0U

ML

[Interlaken]

I have had this trouble on a bung roof and ended up turning it into a chalet but in intervening years I got on roof with a bucket and pointing trowel, scraped moss off, put in bucket and handed it down to an accomplice who spread it on the garden.

Amazing how much weight it amounted to but did the job - don't think jet wash advisable.

[Housemartin]

Keeping a roof clean is not difficult : First remove the existing growth by hand. No jetting preferably. Only the bulky material - moss lumps - needs removing. When the preparation is done, spray with an algaecide : This will kill the remaining bio film, including the dark moulds, algae, lichen, remaining moss etc. Job done. Nature will clear the biofilm. Diurnal cycles, heat, frost wind and rain will begin to work. It takes several months to make a marked difference, but the latent effects will show for a much longer period. Do not wait 20 years to do it again. 10 years will normally keep the roof in clean conditions, without having to remove anything by hand : Look at www.roofclean.co.uk for detailed information.

[quarterday]

What's a bung roof? Something to do with FIFA????


I have had this trouble on a bung roof and ended up turning it into a chalet but in intervening years I got on roof with a bucket and pointing trowel, scraped moss off, put in bucket and handed it down to an accomplice who spread it on the garden.

Amazing how much weight it amounted to but did the job - don't think jet wash advisable.

[jeffrey]

What's a bung roof? Something to do with FIFA?
Or from Bungo-Bungo Land?

[quarterday]

Or from Bungo-Bungo Land?


The only Bungo Bungo land is football

Prince William backs FA over FIFA bungs affair


Read more: http://www.mirrorfootball.co.uk/news/FIFA-news-FA-president-Prince-William-weighs-into-football-corruption-row-and-backs-call-to-postpone-Fifa-presidential-election-article743332.html#ixzz1O7OfcULJ
Sign up for MirrorFootball's Morning Spy newsletter Register here

[quarterday]

Bunga bunga
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Bunga bunga is a phrase of uncertain meaning that dates from 1910 if not earlier. By 2010 the phrase had gained popularity in Italy and the international press as well, when it was used by the Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to refer to his alleged sex parties, which caused a major political scandal in Italy.

Moss?

Kate Moss

Moss in 2005
Born 16 January 1974 (age 37)
Addiscombe, Croydon, London, England
Occupation Model
Height 5 ft 7 in (1.70 m)[1]
Hair colour Brown[2]
Eye colour Hazel
Dress size UK 6 – US 2 – EU 34[2]
Agency Storm Model Management
D'management Group
Marilyn Model Agency
IMG Models
Kate Moss (born 16 January 1974) is an English model. Moss is known for her waifish figure and, popularizing the heroin chic look in the 1990s, which made her a supermodel. She is also famous for her controversial private life, high profile relationships, party lifestyle, and drug use. Moss changed the look of modelling and started a global debate on eating disorders, and her role in size zero fashion. In 2007, she came 2nd on the Forbes top-earning models list, estimated to have earned $9 million in one year.[3]
Contents [hide]
1 Early life
2 Career
2.1 Style
2.2 Campaigns
2.3 Fashion designer
2.4 Other endeavours
2.5 Charity work
3 Personal life
3.1 Cocaine scandal
3.2 Gold statue
4 References
4.1 Notes
4.2 Bibliography
5 External links

[Rodent1]

I have a single story annex with a large pitched roof under silver birch trees - it was covered in clumps of moss.
i waited until the summer last year when it was dried out, I then used a home made tool - an extendable window cleaners pole with piece of 5 mm plywood approx 18" x 3" gaffa taped at 90 degrees to the end of the pole, to loosen and pull clumps off the roof. I worked off a step ladder at gutter level - my days of climbing around of roofs are long gone !

Most of the moss fell into the gutter- which was great - exactly where i wanted it !
To clear the gutter out afterwards i used a 2L milk carton with the bottom cut off at 45 degrees as a "gutter scoop"

can we have a hard question now please :(devil):

[mind the gap]

can we have a hard question now please

Yes! How did you persuade anyone to buy all that wet moss on eBay?:D:

[Rodent1]

Yes! How did you persuade anyone to buy all that wet moss on eBay?


Well i kinda cheated a bit - i made it part of package deal :

Ashtray contents with free bucket of moss ..just to get rid of it !


...it was dry not wet ..i waited until the summer (as above) I can't believe you got out of bed at 4:38 just to post that :(think):

[mind the gap]

Well i kinda cheated a bit - i made it part of package deal :

Ashtray contents with free bucket of moss ..just to get rid of it !


...it was dry not wet ..i waited until the summer (as above) I can't believe you got out of bed at 4:38 just to post that :(think):

I didn't. It was 3.38.

[Rodent1]

I didn't. It was 3.38.


LLZ clock had you tapping on your keyboard at 4:38 ??


LLZ clk is corrct on my comp .....are you on a different time zone up north ?:(mm):

[mind the gap]

LLZ clock had you tapping on your keyboard at 4:38 ??


LLZ clk is corrct on my comp .....are you on a different time zone up north ?:(mm):
The LLZ clock is always an hour ahead for me. It registers my posts as an hour ahead. Then sometimes, the next day, it sorts it all out and they appear as having been posted at the correct time. I don't really care, though. It's boring.

[Amoy]

Sounds daft, but following a tip from a neighbour we once filled a water sprayer with vinegar, sprayed the moss and left it for a few hours. It loosened the moss and was much easier to clean off after that. We didn't need a pressure hose, just dumped buckets of water on it and whole patches slid straight off. We needed a stiff brush for some sections, but it certainly worked!

[mind the gap]

Did you know that there are still communities around the world who use moss as babies' nappies? (Not when full of vinegar, though).

[Interlaken]

I picked up another tip for preventing moss on roofs from an elderly gent in my road. If you can get copper wire and stretch it across the ridge of a pitched roof from one end of building to the other rainwater contaminated by the copper will prevent the formation of moss.