Thatched roofing is ancient and still beautiful – just think of all the gingerbread-looking houses on the idyllic German island of Sylt. But talk about planned obsolescence! And the fire hazard means higher insurance premiums. Unless you live in a thatched cabana on the beach, it’s rustic roofing for the rich.
That’s why toolmaker Heinz Lichter has a dream: put his new PVC hybrid thatch – LongerLife Reed – on all the roofs of Sylt.
‘’Then you can shoot off fireworks at New Year’s,’’ he says.
LongerLife Reed, developed by Lichter-Extrusionstechnik, replaces natural reed with thin-walled pipes manufactured from wood/PVC composites without compromising the visual appearance.
Lichter says precision is not the objective if you’re trying to mimic Mother Nature.
‘’The key is not the exact geometry but getting a conical reed,’’ Lichter says.’’A smooth surface? Not necessary. The reed would slip during thatching. Exact length? That’s not what nature grows. Any length between 0.9 m and 1.6 m is fine. The color may vary within a certain range.’’
The hybrid thatch ‘’can last as long as PVC – for decades,’’ Lichter says. And the intrinsic fire resistance of PVC meets tough, modern requirements.
The diameter can be reduced from approx. 5.5 mm to 2.5 mm merely by fine-tuning the extrusion process technology and formula, with the aim of achieving a highly elastic melt.
There is no danger of rot, which extends the lifetime of the roof. No limitations on the roof pitch. The natural product does not shrink: what is put on the roof stays there.
Renewable raw materials are used, similar to WPC. The calibration and tool technology was specially designed for this product, which consists of conical tubes. The installation technology and tools are the same that are also used for natural thatch.
But making the thatch itself required retooling, Lichter says.
‘’Tools for such a challenge do not exist. Therefore, apart from the product itself, the production machinery also had to be developed - an interesting task for a tool maker,’’ he says.
To make the new product a commercial success, the distribution will be managed by a Dutch reed dealer. The production will be located in Belgium, Lichter says.
‘’I expect some additional work from the supply of tools, special machine components and the related know-how for my tool construction business, which I founded in 1979,’’ he says.
‘’My activities in recent years have been focused on the manufacture and supply of multilayer casing heads, now with diameters of up to 500 mm. So the conical reeds with a max. Ø of 5.5 mm fit in nicely.’’
First Sylt, then the world!
