Why builders prefer stone coated tiles

Developers are now more interested in stone coated roofing tiles. They say apart from their beauty, they are advancement from the commonly used aluminum sheets.Basically, there are two types of roofing tiles – stone coated roof tiles and stone chip coated steel roof tiles.Stone chip coated steel roof tiles are made of natural stone over […]

Developers are now more interested in stone coated roofing tiles. They say apart from their beauty, they are advancement from the commonly used aluminum sheets.
Basically, there are two types of roofing tiles – stone coated roof tiles and stone chip coated steel roof tiles.
Stone chip coated steel roof tiles are made of natural stone over galvanized sheet or gavalum. Gavalum does not rust and it has minimum of 50 years guaranty.  There are two components of it, gavalum and the natural stone.
Stone coated tiles are long lasting and weather friendly. If it is hot outside, a house with the tiles is cool inside. If it is cold outside, it is not too cold inside. It is resistant to extreme weather conditions. It moderates the weather.
Experts say the noise from aluminum sheets is high. For instance when there is rainfall, the noise from rain drops is high. But with the tiles, the noise is less.
The tiles are in different colours and good producers use natural stone to maintain lasting colour.
But what hinders many builders from using these tiles is high cost. Mr Obinna Okenze is Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Luxury Building and Accessories Nigeria Ltd, a company that deals in stone chip coated roof tiles.
He said, “We from onset were out to provide Nigerians high quality products at affordable prices. The stone chip coated roof tiles are unreasonably priced in Nigeria. What we’re doing is to give Nigerians high quality product at affordable price.
“We provide for the low, medium and high classes. We’ve made it possible for the middle income earners to have the best materials that before now were for the high income earners. We intend to eliminate the middlemen. We source the gavalum directly.”
He said his company has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with its foreign partners to build a roof tiles manufacturing company in Nigeria as another way of reducing cost.
Luxury Building and Accessories Nigeria Ltd has won three awards this year alone for its successful promotion and sale of stone coated roof tiles in Nigeria. It is billed for another award this week in Lagos. It was declared the Roof Tiles Company of the Year 12 during the 7th Abuja Housing Show in June 2013.
Okenze said, “We bring our gavalum from the best rolling mills in the world. We take the bonds from Italy and assemble them in South Korea. Our bonds are the strongest-even if you soak our tiles in water for many hours and do abrasion test on them, they’ll till stay. Our stiles hardly have stone separation.  
“Nigerians like quality products. Nigeria is a big market. There should be quality control. Government should stop dumping of all sorts of products in the country.
“There are roofs that under one year, the colour has changed. If you sell a product to a consumer and it fades or the stone separates, it’s robbery as far as I’m concerned.”
He confirmed that many Nigerian artisans can install these tiles. Some of them can compete with their foreign counterparts.