The short answer
Some of it, yes. Soft foam can be cut and pulled by hand, and plenty of owners have tried. The trouble is what lies beneath. Foam grips rafters, felt and tile backs, so an enthusiastic scrape can tear the membrane or gouge a timber you cannot then see. Add the dust, the awkward loft and the waste, and an owner is usually better off having a roofer do it.
Pulling foam off is the easy part to imagine. The real question is what you might damage in the roof while you do it.
What goes wrong when foam is pulled by hand
Spray foam is sprayed on as a liquid and sets hard against whatever it touches. In a pitched roof that means the rafters, the angled beams holding the whole roof up, and often the underlay as well, a waterproof sheet stretched beneath the tiles. The small laths the tiles hang from, called battens, get coated too.
Why does the roof suffer more than the foam?
Soft foam can come away in clumps, and that tempts people to keep pulling. Yet the foam may be bonded to the underlay, so a firm tug rips the sheet and opens a path for rain. A chisel or scraper used on a rafter takes a layer of the wood with it, and a cut across the grain weakens the timber for good.
Rigid foam is worse. Where it has set onto the backs of tiles, levering it free can lift or crack them. A cracked tile is not obvious from inside the loft, so the first warning can be a ceiling stain after the next storm. A roofer working from the outside as well as the inside can spot that coming. A person alone in the loft cannot.
Dust, access and working in a foamed loft
A foamed loft is not a place to improvise. Cutting and scraping foam throws fine particles into the air, and they settle on the ceiling boards, the stored boxes and the insulation below. Dust like this drifts into rooms through the hatch and around light fittings, so the work needs sheeting, careful bagging and clearing as you go.
Is it safe to move about up there?
Between the joists, the timbers the bedroom ceiling hangs from, there is only plasterboard. Step off a joist and a foot goes straight through. In a lit but cramped loft, with a cutting tool in one hand and a bag in the other, it is easy to slip. Low rafters mean working bent over, and the heat in summer makes it worse.
There are also cables to think about. Wiring for lights or smoke alarms is often buried in the foam, and a blade through a cable causes a different kind of trouble. We find where the wiring runs before any cutting starts. Waste matters too, because bags of cut foam are bulky, and ordinary household collections will not take them. Taking the lot away is part of the job when we do it.
Looking at the timbers once the foam has gone
Owners usually want the foam out so they can see what is under it. That is where a DIY removal usually falls short. Taking the foam off is one job. Reading what appears underneath is another, and it is where a roofer earns the visit.
What should the bare rafters tell you?
Once the timber is bare, a roofer checks for soft or darkened wood, for marks where damp has been sitting, and for nail heads and fixings that have rusted. The laths and the back of the sheet get the same look. Damage found at this stage can be put right while the loft is open, which is far cheaper than finding it after the loft is insulated again.
Owners who remove foam themselves often stop at the first clean-looking rafter and miss the damaged one further along the slope. Photographs matter as well. A buyer's surveyor or a lender may want to see the roof structure, and dated pictures of the bare timbers, taken by the person who inspected them, are what carries weight. If you want a view on the timbers, see our guide on spray foam and timber rot.
When a roofer does it, and what to ask first
Foam removal is roofer's work because the two halves of the job meet in the same place. The foam sits on the inside of the roof, while the tiles, slates and underlay that it clings to are the roofer's trade. Our page on spray foam insulation removal explains how the whole job runs, from the first survey to the finished loft.
How do we handle it differently?
We survey first, from the hatch and from outside, and you see photographs of your own loft before anything is priced. The foam type, its depth, where it is bonded and what is likely to sit underneath all shape the method. A single written total follows. Cutting is done with the dust controlled, the cables are traced, and the waste is taken away.
If you still want to try a small patch yourself, say a few clumps of soft foam near the hatch, stay on the ladder and wear a mask and eye protection. Leave the roof slope, the felt and anything bonded to tiles alone. For the technique itself, read how spray foam is removed before you decide.
More on doing it yourself
Is it cheaper to take spray foam out myself?
It can look cheaper, but the saving shrinks if you tear the underlay, damage a rafter or crack tiles. Repairs then arrive on top of the foam work, and you still need the waste taken away. A survey tells you what the foam is bonded to, so you can weigh the choice on facts.
Can I take off just the soft foam near the loft hatch?
A small patch of soft foam near the hatch, reached from a ladder, is a low-risk job if you wear a mask and eye protection and bag the waste. Anything further along the slope, bonded to felt, or close to cables should be left for a roofer who can see what is behind it.
The full picture: Spray foam insulation removal in Taunton ยท More short answers