What we get called out to here
- Extreme wind exposure. Nowhere in the metro drives rain harder onto vertical surfaces. On this coast the elevations matter more than the roof — a building here can have a perfectly sound roof and still be wet inside, because the water is arriving horizontally. See wall crack repair and façade sealing.
- Salt. Blouberg, Big Bay and Melkbosstrand properties sit in more or less constant salt spray. Chloride attacks coatings, corrodes fasteners and eats balustrade fixings and flashings. Systems that comfortably give a decade inland need specifying differently here.
- Sandy ground and a shallow water table. Water moves fast and unpredictably through sand. The signature here is water appearing in a garage or a ground-floor room at floor level rather than soaking through a wall — which makes it a drainage problem, not a waterproofing one.
- Sectional-title stock. A large share of Parklands, Sunningdale, Century City and Big Bay is complexes and apartment blocks, where the roof, the façades and the balconies are common property. That makes the work a body corporate decision and it needs quoting in a form that survives a trustee meeting.
- Flat concrete roofs on newer builds. The same parapet and outlet detail failures as the Northern Suburbs, with considerably more wind uplift working at the membrane edges and terminations. See torch-on waterproofing for what a correct termination looks like.
- Wind-blown sand. An underrated one. Sand accumulates in gutters, box gutters and roof outlets far faster here than anywhere else in the metro, and a blocked outlet turns a flat roof into a shallow pond in a single winter front.
Specifying for a high-wind coastal site
Wind exposure changes the specification in three concrete ways, and a contractor who quotes a West Coast property the same way they quote a Durbanville one is not paying attention.
- Terminations and fixings. Membrane edges need mechanically fixing and sealing, not merely bonding. Wind uplift works at every free edge, and an edge that lifts even slightly lets driven rain underneath.
- Corrosion-resistant metalwork. Stainless or hot-dip galvanised fixings, flashings and brackets rather than plated. Plated fixings within a kilometre of the water start bleeding rust within a couple of seasons and stain the façade.
- Breathable elevation treatment. A penetrating silane cream rather than a film-forming sealer, so that salt-laden moisture already in the wall can still escape outward instead of being trapped behind a skin.
Body corporate and complex work
Because so much of this corridor is sectional title, a large part of what we do here is scheme work — full complex roofs, balcony refurbishments and façade sealing programmes. Those quotes are itemised by building and by element, with the system named, the areas measured, the guarantee term stated and the exclusions listed, so trustees can compare them against each other properly and put them to a members' meeting.
Where a scheme is phasing the work over several financial years, we will set out which elements are genuinely urgent and which can wait, rather than quoting the whole envelope as one undifferentiated number.
Areas covered
Table View, Blouberg, Bloubergstrand, Milnerton, Sunningdale, Parklands, Melkbosstrand, Big Bay, West Beach, Century City and Montague Gardens.
Common questions
Why does my west-facing wall get damp and nothing else does?
Because that is the elevation taking the wind-driven rain. On the West Coast the prevailing wet-season wind puts water onto west and north-west faces with real force, and it enters through porous plaster and hairline cracks that never leak in still rain.
Who arranges waterproofing in a sectional title complex?
The body corporate, through the trustees and managing agent — the roof and external walls are common property. We quote in an itemised format suitable for tabling at a trustee meeting.