- FROM SWANSEA:
- road distance: 9.84 mi
- COUNCIL:
- Neath Port Talbot
- HOMES:
- built in phases
Rooflights and skylights fitted in Rhos, Neath Port Talbot
Rhos, outside Pontardawe in the Swansea Valley: new glass for roofs of several ages, and swaps for old units that have given up.
Free survey / fixed written quote / Building Control notification handled / 10-year workmanship guarantee
Wet days in a valley village
A rooflight in Rhos faces the same test as one anywhere in the valley: a long wet afternoon, and a room underneath that people still want to use. Four things decide how it goes, and they are the same four whether the roof is new or has been there for decades.
The first is run-off. On a flat roof, glass sitting on a kerb with no fall will hold a pool against the frame. Rainclear gives 5° as the minimum slope on the kerb of its flat glass rooflights, to limit pooling. On a pitched roof, wind is the test, since it drives rain upslope, and the flashing around the window has to be tucked into the covering correctly.
Where a slope is gentle, VELUX points to its low-pitch roof window, which it rates for slopes of 10° up to 20°. A steeper slope takes the ordinary kind.
The second is what happens when the sash is open. On VELUX's solar and electric models a sensor detects rain and the sash shuts on its own, which suits a room aired through the working day.
The third is the damp that builds inside. Showers, kettles and washing racks add moisture, and the glass in the roof is the coldest thing it can reach. Better glazing helps, and so does a vent that works.
The fourth is the view. Glass that gathers dirt stops looking like a window and starts looking like a lid, so put it where you can wipe it, or ask about a coating made to keep it clean.
| Where it sits | Roof | Swap or add |
|---|---|---|
| Older house with an old roof window | pitched slope | like-for-like swap, matched by size code |
| Later house on a newer street | pitched, tiled | new roof window over a back room |
| Rear extension | flat | flat rooflight, kerb-mounted |
| Landing with no window | loft space above | sun tunnel from the dome down |
- COMMUNITY:
- Cilybebyll
- COLLIERY:
- Primrose, from the mid-1800s
- VALLEY:
- Swansea Valley
A coalfield village outside Pontardawe
Rhos is a village in the Swansea Valley, outside Pontardawe, in the Neath Port Talbot county borough of South Wales and in the community of Cilybebyll. We fit in Alltwen and Glais too.
Originally part of the Cilybebyll estate, the Primrose Colliery was developed from the mid-1800s close to the village. The colliery closed in the early 1900s, but from 1908 it came back as a pumping station for the Tarenni Colliery. On 13 October 1858, when the pit was owned by Morgan and Lewis, fumes from an engine boiler suffocated 14 men and boys and 7 horses. After that disaster the pit had been redeveloped as the New Primrose Colliery, owned by Sir Ralph Howard, and by 1896 it employed 307 people.
Like many villages in the former South Wales Coalfield, Rhos has seen phases of major building development within its boundaries, bringing an influx of new residents to a community historically known for its own particular identity. A village built up in phases tends to hold homes from several periods side by side. Those are general patterns for places that grew that way, and the survey tells us what your own roof is.
Rhos lies north-east of Swansea, 9.84 road miles away, so a survey here is a short journey for us. Pontardawe shares the same council, Neath Port Talbot.
For a rooflight, that history means the first questions are the shape of the roof, the room underneath and the weather the glass faces. Slates or tiles in a slope take a roof window set flush with them. A flat extension roof carries a kerb-mounted rooflight, and a landing with only loft space overhead is the sun tunnel's job.
- mid-1800sPrimrose Colliery developed
- 1896New Primrose Colliery employs 307
- 1908revived as a pumping station for Tarenni
- PLANNING:
- Neath Port Talbot Council
- FLATS:
- no householder rights
- LISTED HOMES:
- consent through the council
Rights that come with a house, and rights that go
A Rhos application is read by Neath Port Talbot Council's planners. Whether your house has to send one for a rooflight depends on its rights, and the starting point is in the Wales skylight planning guide, which sets out when a house can go ahead without one. Protected land is the exception. A conservation area, the Gower AONB, Bannau Brycheiniog National Park or a World Heritage Site takes a house into planning permission for any rooflight in the slope, and Rhos is not inside the Gower AONB.
The rights a house starts with can go. In a village that has grown in phases, a newer street may have its own planning history, and the permission first granted for a house can include a condition that removes the rights. A council can also make an Article 4 direction over a whole area. Neither shows from the street, so the paperwork for your house is what answers it, and the council can tell you.
Flats and maisonettes have no householder rights to begin with, and the Welsh Government's flats and maisonettes page sets that out. A listed house is a separate case: a rooflight that would alter its special character needs listed building consent from the council, and Cadw's consent guidance explains what is covered. Cadw also says that replacing traditional windows with uPVC on a listed building will not normally be acceptable, so a like-for-like swap there needs care.
For a written answer, ask the borough's planners about a Lawful Development Certificate. The borough's planners issue it, and it sits well among the deeds.
Wales has two kinds of building control body for Building Regulations work: the council's own service, and a private registered building control approver. You are free to choose between them. The private firms answer to the Building Safety Regulator, and the Welsh Ministers regulate the council teams.
Building Regulations are a separate track, and they bite on windows because a window is a controlled fitting. A brand-new opening will generally need approval. When the work is notifiable, we handle the notification through local authority building control or a registered building control approver, as you prefer.
- LIKE FOR LIKE:
- building work
- GLASS ONLY:
- outside the energy rules
- NEW OPENING:
- approval generally needed
Swapping what is already in the roof
Old units are part of any village roofscape. A roof window that leaks, mists or sticks is a candidate for replacement, and the table below sets out how the Building Regulations treat a swap, a repair and a new opening, which they do differently.
Open the sash on an old VELUX and look for the stamped plate carrying its code, which gives the width and height. With that in hand a new window can be matched to the opening, and our page on swapping an old leaking VELUX gives the order of play. If the glass has misted between the panes, misted rooflights covers whether the sealed unit or the whole rooflight is the better swap.
The replacement has limits to reach. A roof window in an existing home should meet 1.4 W/m²K or Window Energy Rating Band B, and a rooflight 2.2 W/m²K. The Welsh Approved Document L treats a rooflight as the glazed unit on a kerb or upstand. Where the extension is brand new, we confirm any lantern on it with the council. Energy-efficient rooflights gives the numbers in context.
Glazing options are worth a conversation too. VELUX lists a dirt-repellent coating, rain noise reduction and a laminated inner pane for safety, and which of those a particular window can take varies with the model.
Glass out of reach suits an electric opener, which dispenses with the pole and the stepladder. Roof windows and rooflights get different limits because the Welsh Approved Document L defines them differently: a roof window lies in the plane of the roof, while a rooflight stands out from it on a kerb or upstand.
You get the survey free, then a fixed written quote, and the guarantee on our workmanship, ten years of it, arrives in writing; the terms are on the guarantee page. Phone 01792 929062 or book a visit using the form.
| The job | What it is | Building Regulations |
|---|---|---|
| Whole window, like for like | replacement | still building work |
| New glass, frame stays | replacement of the glass only | outside the energy rules |
| Repair | mending what is there | not building work |
| New opening in the roof | a fresh hole | approval generally needed |
Questions from Rhos
Who decides on planning for a house in Rhos?
Neath Port Talbot Council. Rhos sits in the community of Cilybebyll, inside the county borough, so the borough planners take the application, and the council also runs one of the two building control routes. A registered building control approver is the other. The two decisions are separate, and a single rooflight can involve both.
Is Rhos within your reach from Swansea?
It is, with room to spare. Rhos sits 9.84 road miles out from Swansea, heading north-east, and our radius runs 30 road miles from the city. Ring 01792 929062 or use the form, and the survey visit follows.
Could a condition on my house's planning permission rule out a rooflight?
A condition attached to the permission first granted for a house can remove the rights that would otherwise let it add a rooflight without an application. Newer streets can have such conditions. The council can confirm for your house, and a Lawful Development Certificate makes the answer formal. The council holds the planning history of your street, which is why it can answer where we cannot.
What does a replacement window have to do about ventilation?
After a swap the house should breathe at least as freely as before. Trickle vents in the old window mean vents in the new one of the same size or larger, set by hand or by an automatic control. A window without them needs another route for damp air, which we look at during the survey, so the new window is chosen with the room's air in mind from the start.
Should the extension at the back get a lantern or a flat rooflight?
A flat rooflight sits low on its kerb, and a lantern stands up on an upstand with glass on every slope. Where a flat roof is already built, a lantern added to it usually comes through the planning route, because of how far it stands up. On a brand-new extension, the council has to be asked, and we put the question to Neath Port Talbot Council at the survey.
Which nearby places do you also cover?
Close to Rhos we fit in Pontardawe, Alltwen and Glais, along with the rest of the towns and villages within 30 road miles of Swansea. The same free survey, fixed written quote and ten-year written guarantee on workmanship apply wherever you are in that area.
Nearby towns we also cover
Bulletin Rhos, Neath Port Talbot
Book your free survey
- Survey:
- before we price
- Quote:
- fixed, in writing
- Guarantee:
- 10 years on our workmanship, in writing
No obligation. Building Control notification handled where the work is notifiable.