Worktop replacement in North Feltham

Yes. North Feltham is on the patch, and the postcodes we work here are TW14. It is worked on our west London run, along with the rest of Hounslow. On a street with no restrictions the constraint is other residents rather than a warden, so it is worth putting a cone or a car out early. A replacement is a two-way job, with old tops going out and new stone coming in, so the van needs to stay put across the whole day. A one-hour window will not hold a two-way job. There is nothing to drive to and nothing to pick up, because both visits are to the property itself.

The internal stair is usually a straight flight with a tight top landing, and it is the landing rather than the flight that is the limit. The plaster is bonded straight onto the concrete, so the bottom course of tiles tends to bring plaster with it when the old top comes off, leaving a rough band behind the upstand. The building has kept moving; the new template catches up. Anything that has to stay accessible, a stopcock, a gas meter, a riser panel, is marked on the template so the stone is cut around it instead of over it. The old top has been hiding it, so the first honest look at it happens when the laminate comes off. A straight swap is the exception in an older room.

Door width, hall width and the diagonal at the turn are three separate measurements, and it is the diagonal that catches people out. Worth remembering that the old tops have to come out the way the new ones come in, and a laminate run is easier to remove in one length than to carry in one. The old top leaves by the route the new one arrives on. A free-parking street with cars both sides can still leave the van forty metres away, and that distance is carry, not driving. We stage the strip-out so the old tops leave in one trip rather than trickling out across the afternoon. The strip-out waits until the new stone has somewhere to stand.

Yes. On the research for this patch it is the first of the three jobs listed, ahead of worktop fabrication and worktop installation. Damage in a let flat is settled as a deposit deduction, so a surface that can be repaired in place is worth more than one that has to be replaced whole. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the whole job is one day rather than a kitchen refit. Repairable in place beats replaced whole. The person choosing the worktop is not the person using it, and that shifts the balance from appearance towards running cost. The carcasses have to be sound, because stone is several times the weight of what is coming off. A deposit deduction rarely covers a new top.

Some of them overhang on two sides at once, and each side is worked out separately, because the load on an edge people lean against is not the load on an edge people walk past. Old laminate has often been holding a run square for years, and taking it off shows what the units were really doing. The island top is the one that may want its own slab. Expect £110 to £550 per square metre for material supply only, with templating, fabrication and fitting on their own lines.

A notch around a boxed stack is machined with a radius at the internal corner, because a square inside corner there is exactly where a top will crack. This is the commonest reason a replacement turns out to need more than a straight swap. The wall has not moved, and neither has the problem. Sort a parking bay or permit near the entrance, confirm the lift is in service and get us the door codes, and tell us about any asbestos survey on the flat before we start stripping out. Mixed ownership means the decision-maker is not always the person who lets us in, so it is worth being clear early about who signs the quote off. A replacement keeps the units and changes the surface, which is the least disruptive way to do this in an occupied property. One day out of use, agreed in advance.

A long top on units that were shimmed once and never checked is the commonest version of this, and it is cheap to fix beforehand. If the carcasses are corrected, the template is taken again, since a drawing off units that then moved is worthless. Levelling belongs in the carcasses, on their own legs and packers. A live soil stack cannot be chased back into the wall, so the depth it steals is permanent and the run is planned around it rather than through it. We would rather find it at template than on the morning, which is why the templater looks behind the units. Packing the carcasses is part of the replacement.

Granite is porous to varying degrees, so it is sealed when we fit it and topped up over the life of the worktop. Topping a seal up is a wipe-on job with a cloth. Upkeep is settled when the slab is chosen, since it belongs to the material rather than the fabrication. These are built in dense concrete, so support for a peninsula or an end panel goes in with proper anchors rather than plugs. Plaster bonded straight onto concrete comes away with the bottom course of tiles, leaving a band behind the upstand. A new top on a settled run needs the run corrected first.

The design and quotation visit comes first. It is free and carries no obligation. Nothing is measured until the sink, the tap and the hob are in the room to measure against. The template produces a drawing, and the workshop cuts to that drawing once you agree it. Internal partitions are dense block finished in a hard sand and cement plaster, which is unforgiving to drill and unforgiving to make good. The units stay and only the surface changes, so the job is a day, and what makes it a difficult day is the building. A twenty-year-old run is replaced to its own shape.

Both are templated after the worktop is down and settled, because they are cut to the wall itself. Socket and switch positions have to be final before templating, because the openings are machined rather than chopped out on the wall. Where the kitchen is on the entrance level, the piece comes off the deck and turns straight in without going up or down at all. Anything that has to be held back goes into concrete with proper anchors rather than into a plug and a hope. The fabric gets checked while it is open.