Chinese roof slate

Hi

New to posting to the board but have used it as a good source of info for some time, cheers.

My question is how good is Chinese slate compared to Welsh?

I am currently building a detached garage and want the roof to match the existing on my house. House built in 1880 with what I presume to be Welsh slate.
My local roofing merchant has quoted £18m2 for slate either reclaimed Welsh or new Chinese! Ive heard bad reports about the Chinese slate fading over time and on a local house, that I have been told was built with Chinese slate, the roof looks like a patchwork of different colour slates!

I have looked at both the reclaimed and new in my local merchant and the Chinese certainly looks to be the better buy, but Im a bit worried about how it will look in 5-10 years time.
Any advice appreciated.

Cheers

weddoe said:

Any advice appreciated.

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you seem to have answered your own question

weddoe said:

I have looked at both the reclaimed and new in my local merchant and the Chinese certainly looks to be the better buy, but Im a bit worried about how it will look in 5-10 years time.

Click to expand...

weddoe said:

I have been told was built with Chinese slate, the roof looks like a patchwork of different colour slates!

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Ask to see the BBA for the chinese slate

Not sure how Ive answered my own question? Perhaps my question was not clear.

Has anybody on this forum used a Chinese slate for roofing and if so what was the quality like compared to a reclaimed Welsh? Have the slates faded over time?
In the opinion of the roofers that post on this site is Chinese slate at £18m2 a better buy than reclaim at £18m2?

Shan thanks for the advice I will ask for the BBA.

Cheers

Although Welsh slate by definition is top quality, unfortunately the same cannot be said for Chinese (or Spanish)

China is a huge country with many quarries, and we are importing slate from just a few of them. It is my belief that China has not used their own slate for roofing purposes to any great degree, preferring terracotta, so therefore the slate is generally unproven.

Of the slates that are imported into this country an awful lot of them are c**p and although some seem ok you need to be a geologist and run accelerated weathering tests to prove that they will perform adequately.

If I had your choice I would either try to source a good quality Welsh reclaimed slate or I would have no problem with the Brazilian slate (light grey/greenish) that is being sold by several importers