Hip Iron

[lastofthesummer]

I have recently had some work done to the roof of my bungalow, mainly replacing broken and cracked tiles. At the back of my property one of the hip irons (on the left hand side) was missing and my roofer went out and bought a replacement. However the replacement is completely different looking to the existing hip iron on the right hand side of the roof which is dark in colour and small in size. The one he has bought and fitted appears to be galvanised steel, is a completely different shape to the other one, is light silver in colour and sticks up about 10".

Should I ask him to remove it and find a more suitable replacement or is there any way I can disguise how bad it looks? I don't know if galvanised steel can be bent and curled round into a circle with a pair or pliers or something to make it look smaller. Or can it be painted black with hammerite paint so it doesn't look so obvious?

I don't know what your old one looks like. If you are willing to pay generously, no doubt a matching one could be found or manufactured.

Or you could just paint it. Let the galvanising weather to dull first.

Or stop looking at it. Nobody else will care.

I don't know why people think Hammerite is a good paint.

Galvanised steel can be painted but you need to use the correct primer otherwise the paint will not adhere properly and just flake off in time (my OH works with steel and has often has to paint galvanised items).

Alternatively, replace the existing one so both are new (and matching).

I was just about to say the same but be slightly more gloomy - at work we were generally advised “paint never sticks to galvanising”.

However if you call up Sherwin Williams technical advice line, they can probably help you. Defo worth researching and maybe testing samples at ground level before spending a lot of time on the roof.

good luck

I agree with @Nourishinghandcream about the appropriate primer. It is surprisingly heavy and expensive, but you can buy a 150ml tin. Let galvanising weather to dull before trying to paint it. Use a normal paint system, not Hammerite. Correct paint will last for many years.

If you don't paint galvanised steel, it will last quite a long time. Maybe 10 or 20 years. There is a way of calculating it from thickness, which I don't know. I am in a coastal area which is quite bad for rust.

Not as expensive as I remember if you can find a small tin. A small one will be plenty.

Example https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_nkw=galvanised+primer+-cold+-paint+rustins&sacat=0&from=R40&LHTitleDesc=0&LHPrefLoc=1&oac=1&sop=15

(Don't buy "cold galvanising paint" which is a coating containing powdered zinc. Not the same thing and IME forms a relatively soft layer)

(Sherwin Williams is an American company. In UK you could ask Brewers, they retail a wide range, and sometimes have sample-sized pots, or one of the big paint makers.)

I know - such a shame they bought the best British paint supplier. Although they still have a database of all the heritage recipes. Once managed to get the spec for local Edwardian estate houses where the colour was slowly being removed. Unfortunately I would have had to order 50 gallons…

I just looked up the one I use, amazingly it is more than £50 a litre.

I have not bought any since I retired.

But, I see I made a bracket for my gutter when the roof was being repaired, painted it black, and it still looks fine after 15 years of weather exposure. Fixed with stainless screws.