I was sat at the computer when it suddenly sounded like the tiles were sliding off the roof. I looked out the window and realised it was the canopy above the front door which had fallen off the wall. It looks a bit like this:
On closer inspection it appears to have been held in with 8 screws which were only about 2½ inches into the brickwork. The gap between my front door and the footpath is only about 3 feet and the canopy ended up on the footpath – anyone passing by could have been been seriously hurt and I’m trying not to think about my daughter going out the door and slammed it behind her causing it to come down.
The house is only 5 years old – I moved in when it was new – and there are many of these canopies on the development I live on. They are still building here so I am going to the sales centre tomorrow to see if I can pique the builders interest. Hopefully they will take this seriously as this thing took three of us to move it even after all the tiles had fallen off so the consequences of one of these falling onto someone would be pretty.
The question is, do I have any comeback with the builder in getting this sorted, would it be covered by the NHBC guarantee? I could go down the insurance route but this will end up costing me incrased premiums for years. Not putting it back is not an option as the cheapskates have put breezeblocks in the wall in the area where the canopy sits.
If you bought it new surely you have the usual (10?) year warranty on new houses? That’s an abomination, and exactly why I never trust anyone to build or fix anything properly, I’d rather cock it up myself and know it’s a risk than pay someone to do it AND not know! Bad luck, hope it gets sorted easily, I’m sure it will.
You need to check what’s covered with the NHBC guarantee.
I’d reckon they might be worried about sorting this, since it could happen to any of the other houses built around the same time, for the reasons you suggest.
Take a photo of it in the morning. It should have been held in by more than just screws, probably anchor bolts or similar. At 5 years old it should be covered by NHBC but to be honest it may be easier and quicker for you to sort it.
You need to check what’s covered with the NHBC guarantee.
I’d reckon they might be worried about sorting this, since it could happen to any of the other houses built around the same time, for the reasons you suggest.
From what I have read in the past the whole house has to disappear into a hole which you have to prove you knew nothing about before the NHBC become interested.
I’m honestly more concerned with no one being under one of these if it falls off so I’m hoping the builders treat this with some degree of seriousness.
That is fantastically shonky just wait for the next snow fall and see how many more fall off.
This is something I don’t understand – the canopy had a foot and a half of snow on it for the best part of 2 weeks last December and was also hit by an avalanch of ice from the roof when the thaw came. I can only assume this has weakened the fixings but why it chose to fall off tonight is anyone’s guess.
A structural engineer would raise an eyebrow at that.
If I get no joy from the builder I think I will have a word with Building Control at the local council to see if there any regulations regarding the installation of these things.
It’s a bit dark to see at the moment but looking at the picture of the screw I posted above there is a bit of the plug left on the screw and it looks like a standard issue brown rawlplug to me – here is a link to a larger version of the image.
Looks like a brown wall plug which means a no 12 screw. But to be fair, there should be proper wall bolts in there. Christ, I use 12s for skirting sometimes if I really need them to pull into the wall.
Looks like a brown wall plug which means a no 12 screw. But to be fair, there should be proper wall bolts in there. Christ, I use 12s for skirting sometimes if I really need them to pull into the wall.
I did say to one of the neighbours that I would think twice about putting bookshelves up with the screws which were holding this thing up.
Prolonged dry period/shrinkage may have played a part. Plus it had to happen to someone first.
It’s hard to guess the conditions under which things fail. Any snow loading, being straight down, may have increased the grip of the fixings in the masonary, so the failure mode at that time was most likely to be shear. Conversely, the canopy at its lightest may have reduced the downwards loading on the upper fixings, allowing a rotation about the lower fixings while the uppers fixings pulled straight out of the wall.
allowing a rotation about the lower fixings while the uppers fixings pulled straight out of the wall.
At least one of the lower fixings has sheared – I could see the remnants of the screw in the wall, but it has clearly rotated away from the wall to end up where it did.
I would give your local council building control office a call on monday (not a dangerous structure anymore so no need to call out now) and share your concerns as mentioned above.
IMO it’s an open and shut case – the NHBC have a legal responsibility. I would hurry things along by getting in touch with the Mirror or the Sun (depending on your political persuasion) they will almost certainly be interested in the story – specially if it involves interesting and “shocking” pictures, and they can write an alarmist story about the whole estate being at risk and the threat to children’s lives.
Show no mercy – the builders and sub-contractors deserved to be hammered. Do your best to try and ensure that they are.
Not very recently (my last porch was about 8 months ago and was considerably larger than that one) As far as I’m aware none of my porches have ever fallen off. In fact, as far as I’m aware nothing I have ever fixed has ever fallen off. Never had a come back – ever.
bit late i know cos i think they may have already noticed but you need to let others know with the same type of porch to wear safty helmets when entering or leaving their homes me i would be off to wicks for some 2×2 to support it till it was inspected.. nhbc is a none starter its a money earner that does not protect the home owner just creats an industry of paper pushers and they will just make things as hard as possible. remember you have to give them the right to repair but if you do anything yourself let them know and keep photos and bills,
I’ve just been to the sales centre. The woman in there was with a customer and really couldn’t get me out of the door quick enough. All she would say was that it was outside the builders guarantee period and was completely unconcerned that another of these things could fall off and hurt someone. She told me to ring head office in the morning but I had to fight to get her to give me the number.
I am a bit reticent about going round all the neighbours and stirring anything up until I’ve given the builder (Bellway by the way) a chance to deal with the issue. I’ve been round and counted 17 more of this exact same design on the development and also some much larger ones which appeared to be supported in the same way. I will ring the head office first thing, if they don’t show some urgent interest then I will be onto building control and round the neighbours.
The canopy as it is now (without any slates) takes two people to lift and we estimated the weight to be somewhere about 100kg. There are 66 tiles on next doors canopy and having weighed one I know they weigh just over 2kg each. So this thing weighs well north of 200kg. On closer inspection in the daylight I discovered there were actually only 6 screws holding it up and they were only into brown rawlplugs, on one of these the plug was into mortar and doing nothing to provide support. And it turns out I was being generous when I said there was 2½ inches of screw in the wall – this was one of the longer screws. The 4 screws holding the supporting brackets underneath had 1¾ inches of screw in the wall:
Anyone know of any online resources which give recommended load limits for different kinds of fixings?