Ice Dams Are Not a Roofing Problem

Welcome one and all. It's time for another Wise Home Energy Show here on The Voice of Liberty. Thank you very much for joining us. Pure energy.

And here's your host with the most, Jeff Flaherty. Hey, Bob. Great to be back here. Good to have you back here. What's up? Always a great that we have these monthly little visits here. Last month we had your, your crazy brother.

I did. The, uh, supervisor of Webster, and it' was always nice chatting with him. And, uh, so, uh, what are we talking about this week? Today, uh, I think it's time to talk about, uh, icicles and ice dams. Even though it's springtime, uh, we had a l- little bit of an ice experience this past winter. So we- Yes

... uh, we got a lot of calls from people with, uh, ice on their roof. And, uh, I thought it was a great time to talk about that because it's always a pet peeve of mine when, uh, when this happens, uh, because people don't even know that they're an issue. We make, uh, Christmas decorations with icicles on them. So it's, they look great for the season, but they're a sign of energy and heat loss, and they're a sign of really damage to your home. It, it's kind of astounding. And so this was one of those years in, uh, uh, this market where it, it showed up. Uh, sometimes it's maybe been five years since it showed up and, and people would, um, call up and, and, you know, want it fixed immediately. And, and really, really what the ice and the ice dams are caused by is, is a kind of a repetitive pattern of snow and some, some temperatures between probably 20 and 30 degrees, but the outdoor temperature doesn't get above 32 degrees. So the natural ambient temperature is not melting the snow. The snow is being melted from inside the home, and that's due to air leakage. Uh, it, the home is not air sealed, and then insulation is not strong enough. And then the third component is, uh, ventilation.

So, um, this, what happens is it, it freezes and it melts on the top of your roof or, or somewhere on your roof, and then melts down. And then as it gets over the end wall, the soffit is hanging over the end wall, and it's naturally colder. It is the outdoor temperature, and it freezes there.

And then that night it gets cold again and, and, uh, now the roof's a little exposed and the sun can beat on it the next day, or if you get a little more snow, and this cycle happens. And as it keeps happening and that temperature doesn't rise above 32 degrees, you will get the ice hanging off the roof. And then as the ice builds and clamps onto that structure, it will cause a dam where the water cannot move past it. And it starts to back up under the roof, and it'll start to back up into the, the attic first, and then, and then the home. Starts to lift up the shingles.

Yeah. And so the components of the home when it's happening, you may not know it, but some of the components are, are wet. Um, we've seen... You know, we've, can see ice up in soffits and things like that. And, and so it can do a lot of damage to the home, but it, it can also, um, cause ice dams to happen in the future because it's gonna... If the insulation gets wet, it degrades the insulation. Mm-hmm. So once you have it, it can happen again. Now, next winter, if we have a nice snowstorm and the next day it's 40, uh, you won't get it. It, it all kind of depends on if those perfect conditions happen. But those conditions are showing you that there's a problem in the home that can be dramatically improved or eradicated altogether.

And so when it's happening, it's, it's very stressful when you see this on your home. Sometimes it's dangerous over a doorway or a driveway.

Uh, but it's, it's very stressful. And so there's things you can do. You, you, if you chip away at] the ice, you could damage the roof. We don't advise people getting on the roof. Uh, if you can get the four, first four foot of snow off the roof by the soffit, uh, ahead of the game, if you know your, house is, uh, uh, susceptible to ice issues, then, you know, roof raking, as, uh, we call it, it's a good workout. Uh, but you wanna get that snow off the first four foot. Then when, as it melts, it doesn't really have much to back up into. Once the ice happens, then it's a problem trying to get that snow off. A roof rake is a, is a real thing, by the way. It is. You, you can get those at, uh, the hardware store. You can get them at the big box stores.

Much safer than climbing a ladder, especially when there's ice and snow up there. Yeah. When I was a kid, I've done some of those crazy things. Um, uh, I'm sure I was all covered by insurance. But, uh, I was on roofs shoveling them off. I roof raked. Uh, I once was on a roof with a snowblower. That was kind of an interesting story. Maybe we'll do a whole show on that one.

Um, but it, it can... So when it's happening, you just wanna kinda, kinda manage the problem when it's, when it's happening. You can throw some calcium chloride up there. You wanna be careful with salt. Salt can damage roofs.

Salt can drain down and damage the plants. So calcium chloride is the recommended, uh, product to get up there. So you just kinda wanna manage the conditions.

Now is not the time to fix it. 'Cause we, people call us and we say, "Well, it's wet. We can't, we can't really go up in the attic. That's probably wet up there." Um, and it's not gonna, it's, it's not gonna correct it at that moment. And so one of the things I always see is, uh, you know, the roofers will, will place ads for removing the ice. And, and this is a very expensive process to do. So if you've e- ever entertained that or you've paid for that, this would be a good time to say, "You know, maybe I don't wanna deal with this annually every year. And maybe I don't want... Let's, let's correct this." Uh, for good. And, and then you, you see the TV news stories and they, they... it looks good out. It's the ice. Who do they call? They call the roofer to tell you about the ice problem. Well, the roofer is not really the ice remediation. Well, he's to get the ice off the roof, yeah. And so I was talking to a roofer recently who said, uh... I go, "What do you do?

Do you get calls on this?" And he goes, "We go out in the first year." He said, "But the ice and water shield is... Your roof is not meant to be a bathtub. It's not meant- ... to hold water." He said, "The ice and water shield is, it's really just your emergency brake, and there's staples in it, and it's-- They, they install it by code or just good practice, but it's not meant to really, really stop the ice."

And, and so the roofers, uh, when I go to some of the, uh, training sessions with ve-ventilation, the ventilation manufacturers are training the roofers. They're really doing the best they can with the n- the limited knowledge they have. So they'll, they'll say

50% low ventilation to it be the intake and 50% high. And so that is really good practice, uh, if the home allows that. Uh, so I was asking one recently, I said, "Do, does your turbine, uh, fans..." This is a manufacturer's rep. I said, "Do they work on stack effect or strictly wind?"

And the rep said, "Well, I, I don't know what stack effect is." And so if you don't know what stack effect is, you're not gonna understand the house is leaking heat through stack effect through the house. Uh, so sometimes they say the attic ventilation will work a little bit on stack effect, too. There's different pressures, uh, as you raise elevation, similar to driving your car up a, a, a mountain or a hill, you'll hear your ears pop a little bit. Well, there's s-smaller pressures in the attic and so I was kinda shocked that they didn't know that, but they never talk about air sealing an attic. So they... all they know is vent, vent, vent, vent, and it, it's a great idea, but, um, they're kinda limited with the idea of their products. And what I find interesting is the roofers tend to install ridge caps, which ridge caps are... go on the, the top part of your roof. And, uh, when they, when they're on there, some, some have a, a filter to them and some don't have a filter. But either way, when you get a bunch of snow on there, I fail to believe that the air is gonna come out of there at the top. And, and I quizzed the manufacturer on that, and they said, "Oh, it does, and here's some pictures." And in, in my experience, m- that may not be the case. Uh, where metal box vents will work better 'cause the sun is gonna beat down and, and kinda keep that, that metal box vent heated so the air will come out. Sometimes they're called mushroom vents. Uh, so it's- Are those the boxes that have fans in them? So they do have those.

Um, and so the, the exhaust companies make those also. And, and really when you go to their trainings, they, they have the intake, which is usually soffit vents. So they, the, the soffit, uh, the ventilation manufacturers make soffit vents, but that's really for old wood style soffits. When you start getting a vinyl sided home, they come right up and they vinyl over the soffit.

So they have vented vinyl soffits. So now it's really into the, the siding person's responsibility. And we pull those down sometimes, and they're not even cut. It's just all lipstick on a, on a pig sometimes. Oh my gosh. So that's the intake. Then the ex-exhaust... So you need 50% intake, 50% exhaust. So- Now, what, what does that mean? So, uh, it's called a balanced ventilation system. So similar to, uh, well, your, your, your veins and your arties, uh, uh, arteries. It's coming and going. Uh, your lungs, you're breathing in and out, and kind of the same thing with the, the ventilation. We want the air to come in low, and we want it to leave high, and it's gonna carry out any heat or moisture that's inadvertently up in the attic.

Uh, so but they clearly tell you not to mix exhaust types. Uh, all manufacturers tell you that. So there's a ridge vent. Uh, if you have, see a ridge vent, you don't wanna see a box vent, which is an exhaust vent, a gable vent, which is an exhaust vent, or a power vent, or a turbine vent. Uh, and you'll see them mixed a lot. Sometimes the home only allows that. So there's some homes, uh, in the Rochester area, I call them two-foot slope homes. So they're Colonials, but there's no overhang.

So there's just a slope, and you can't really do soffits there, uh, effectively without, uh, doing a lot of, uh, uh, construction or deconstruction. And that's because the, the pitch of the roof is too shallow?

It's too- It, it's because it, it's... The protocol for the two-foot slope is to dense pack it and, and fill it fully of cellulose to stop the, uh, uh, the airflow. So we wanna cut off that flow. And if you stick a baffle down there that's really flimsy, you're gonna dense pack it and crush it, so you can't really separate the air path for the ventilation and the insulation path.

So the best path is just to, to completely insulate that two-foot slope and then treat the, the rest of the attic as, uh, its own entity. And we might use gables over to ridge vents. So the, the manufacturers don't really have a, a plan for, for everything.

Um, so, you know, e-each, each situation is different, and that's why we recommend the assessment and, and really analyzing, um, what is the cause. And, and as I was saying before, the, you know, the roofers get on the line and, or on TV, and they just tell you You know, how to correct it short term. It's not really a long-term thing of, uh, ice and water shield or the big myth is cleaning your gutters.

It, it's just I've never been able to see anybody who can prove that to me. Once the temperature's above 32 degrees outside, the gutter's gonna melt. So the challenge is the, the melting on the snow is taking place when the temperature is below 32 degrees. So the cleaning of the gutter is not gonna take care of any of that issue. Mm-hmm. Um- You're listening to Jeff Flaherty, by the way, and he is the guy behind Wise

Home Energy, the sponsor of this great program, The Wise Home Energy Show on the WISL stations. And, uh, you know, if you're cold in your home, you're supposed to pick up the phone and call. 585-270-5836. We've got, uh, no-cost assessments. We can, uh, really find out what you're looking to fix. We use the energy, uh, programs, the no-cost assessments and rebates to really address well beyond energy loss, problems like ice dams and uncomfortable second floors and, um, musty basements, things like that.

Uh, so and, and ice really, ice really falls into that. You know, one of the things people can do, they'll call up and they say, "I have ice." Uh, and we'll say, "Oh, take a picture of your roof." And so they intuitively think they w- they want us to send pictures of their ice, so they'll send the ice and, and the ice is always at the edge of the roof. That's where the ice has to- It's always there. It's always there. It's never on top, no. And I almost,

I, I almost instinctively have to say, "I don't, I don't wanna see the ice. I wanna see your roof." So what we, what we tell people is always take pictures. Whenever you have a condition that you don't understand or wanna verify is take pictures, 'cause within a week? that ice was all gone. And so what we wanna see is pictures of the roof that show uneven snow melt. That's... Uneven snow melt will confirm, uh, what our diagnostics were finding. But that is really, uh, when you get concrete pictures, evidence of what's going on, when it's happening. So when it's not snowing, if you can get, um, a good frosted roof, when you get a good frost line, you wake up in the morning, take some pictures of your, take some pictures of your roof. We'll see uneven melt. Now, you'll see uneven melt around a chimney. A chimney's gonna have some heat coming off it. Uh, you'll see some sewer stacks. But when you see some of these snow, the patterns is, it's almost, uh, comical how much you can tell by the house, uh, by not going inside, but by looking at] that snow pattern. So that's a good way for people to just kind of document their home and, and get a good idea before they go out, and start looking for solutions to this, uh, problem. And a roofer is not necessarily the person to rely on because they don't do this.

No. No, and one of the things I've always wanted to do some seminars with, roofers is if they, uh, if they... Typically they'll quote you a price to do the roof, and, they'll say, "I need delaminated plywood."

So delaminated plywood is not roof leaks typically. If it's down at the lower edge of the, of the roof, that is moisture coming from the heated area that is, uh, having a cycle of getting it wet and drying, wet and drying, and it'll delaminate the plywood.

So if you're replacing plywood, there's an air sealing insulation ventilation problem. The only one the roofer can typically take care of is, uh, the ventilation problem. Um, so now I, I recently a couple years ago, about five years ago, we had a customer with a ranch home call us up, and he had three inches of fiberglass and, and we showed him that we had an air seals attic, and we call it a tiger trap. The stairway is, uh, going down to the basement. Uh, that's what it looks like in the attic. If it's got, if it's, uh, on' a slant, the drywall, you can see that up in the attic.

And, and then two years later he called us up and we came out and he had, he had blown in the attic and I said, "There's nothing I can do. I, and to fix it I gotta start from scratch." And, and he still gets ice and so now he's called us back and I said, "What, how come you went with somebody else? Why didn't you go with us?" And he said, "I was getting a new roof. And the roofer said, 'If anybody else cuts into this roof, you void the warranty.' So I went with him." And so the roofer is just a blow and go contractor where, uh, it's, kind of like painting a dirty surface. You know- Yeah ... it'll look good for a little bit- Right ... but it, won't hold very long. The prep is, is the key. Um, so that's, you know, nothing wrong. I, I respect the roofers. I meet some roofers that say, you know, we refer out insulation. We tell them we see that there's a problem and we tell them, "You need some insulation."

So, uh, that's smart on those folks' part to, to really be able to identify that this isn't in my wheelhouse, but you should get this corrected. So, um, you know, typical houses that you're gonna see some challenging issues, uh, when you have ducts or, uh, any heating and cooling equipment in an attic is generally a problem. It's giving off a lot of heat. Uh, skylights, um, they're, they're kind of a pain because you've taken a perfectly good ceiling and you've cut a hole in it, and the, the four walls of the skylight are, are losing heat. And so there's wood framing and then there's usually fiberglass around it.

That doesn't help. Uh, recessed lights, uh, homes with very low pitch roof. So we, uh, we had a few calls from some customers that had some ice that we had previously serviced and, and some were, um, just the Mother Nature has just ta- taken over. One is we open up. some of these soffits and, you can see the insulation is, one inch high. I mean, that's how low the pitch was. You're at an

R3, um, you're really relying on a good quality ventilation to overcome the lack of R-value at the, at the, the soffit of the home.

Um, so and then homes with little, uh, soffit venting or no soffit. So some, of the architects, uh, I don't know where they wanted to save on lumber, but they don't have an overhang. They don't have a soffit. The, the, the gutter goes right against the fascia, which is the, the side of the wall of the home.

Um, where the architects get crazy and create lots of dormers and gables, and there's not a lot of soffit venting, uh, those homes become more difficult. But some homes are... can really be eradicated. Uh, proper, uh, ventilation and, uh, air sealing and insulation, we can, uh, completely take care of it. So it's, uh... E- each home is different, but at least you know that you're, you're addressing it.

And, and even after we do all these things, um, we know we can, you know, dramatically improve it, uh, with the ventilation. So I was saying that, that we... a lot of times we're talking a ventilated attic. So if you have a ranch or a colonial, the ceiling is insulated, but the area above it is ventilated.

Um, and really, you have to know your roof. And, and I always wonder, does the roofer know his roof? So we can have an, uh, that's a ventilated attic. That's very common. Uh, but you can have a unvented attic. And so where we think about that is maybe a, a spray foam roof deck. Uh, you can also, um, net and blow with a, a smart vapor retarder, a roof deck, uh, and that's an unvented system. So there's, it, the insulation and the roof deck are one in the same. So that's different than a cathedral ceiling, where there's insulation and a, a vented cavity above it. So, so y- one is somebody, somebody has to know whether they have a vented or unvented roof. It has to be done by design. Uh, an example where you can have a hybrid is a Cape Cod. So we can take those low knee walls, and we can make them unvented attics, those two little sidewall attics.

And then the top attic, we can still use that as a vented attic. So that, that's a good example of sometimes a home, a Cape Cod can be treated with both types of attics. Uh, so you just have to know whether you have a vented or an unvented attic, and then proceed with that game plan. And so

I always wonder, does the roofer know? Has the roofer even gone inside? What if this is a completely spray foamed attic and the roofer's saying, "I need to put a ridge vent in here." It doesn't, it doesn't make any sense. So, um, we need roofers. We need them to stop the water from coming into the home. Uh, so they're good folks to call, but they might not be the folks to call for ice dams and air sealing and insulation.

I'll bet you guys out there never thought that roofs could be this complex. But guess what? There's a lot of things to consider, a lot of, uh, factors.

And, uh, one of the things that, uh, if there's any general overarching principle I've learned from hanging out with, uh, Jeff Flaherty over these years, is there's a lot more to HVAC, keeping your home dry, safe, uh, you know, uh, not too dry, not too wet, uh, than just, you know, putting in a new furnace- Yeah ... and insulating the attic. It's, uh, it's a complex issue. It's all interrelated, and, uh, you need, you need expertise- Yeah ... that you probably never even thought you needed. Yeah. It really, it really is interrelated in how the parts come together. And, and I always say, um, you know, what, if we do a great job in air seal and insulate, and you get no ice, if we get 40 days of snow, and it doesn't get above freezing, you better get a plan to get the snow. off the roof. Because if you're moving toward the Tug Hill area-

Oh, yeah ... you know, there's a video of a, a fire, uh, hall, uh, you know, collapsing under the weight of the snow. Yeah. So you can... The law of un- Crushed it, like an egg. Yeah. A lot of unintended consequences.

Hey, we did a great job. We stopped the ice, but we kept the snow on the roof. It, doesn't... Homes are fluid, and you're still gonna have to, you know, think about the existing conditions out there. There's a, there's a load, there's a load to that roof that it'll handle, and that snow could really, uh, cause a problem.

So, uh, so even though we walk away saying we did a great job, it doesn't mean you still can't... Y- you know, you still need to be responsible and look at your home and, and manage those conditions, uh, outside. So what do you do when you get, you know, I don't know, four feet of snow on the roof?

Yeah. Um- I mean, you can't roof rake all, that. Well, that's, uh... They make some, some neat looking stuff. Uh, that's a g- that's a good question. I, you know, uh, the weight load of that snow and, and, uh, uh, what the temperature, was that brought it. I mean, some of' that light snow, uh, that zero degree snow, is, is super light. But you get that 28 degree snow, and forget it.

That's, uh, that's a heart attack snow. So, um, yeah, sometimes you gotta get up there and just start, you know, getting, getting the shovel going and, and using creative devices. They sell some things, I think, in some north countries that are like, uh, slip and slides. Like the, the, like a wire goes up under the snow with, like, those old roll-out, uh, sleds, toboggans, and the plastic slices it off like a- Huh ... like a piece of cheese. It's pretty- Yeah ... it's pretty neat.

So- I was gonna say, like a cheese slicer. Yeah. Wow. That's, that's, that's really interesting. I, I have done my share of roof. raking on a Kinesis Lake cottage, uh, that, uh, didn't really have a soffit. It just had an overhang. Yeah. The roof, deck just ex- pro- you know, protruded along with the, studs. Yes. Dovetail rafters. Yeah. So yeah, not every home. can be ventilated. And then what happens on those dovetail rafters... So folks, uh, on the older style homes, you'll see, uh, ornate, uh, rafters coming out of the roof line, and sometimes they'll have like a little scallop edge to them. Mm-hmm. And then what happens is the siding person comes and wraps that, so then the insulation person thinks that you can ventilate that. Well, th- there might be no clear-cut cavity because the- Right ... the wall goes right to the roof. Yeah. Th- that was, that was a real problem, massive ice formations-

Yeah. ... on those, uh, dovetail rafters. Yeah. And, uh, eventually what we had to do is use ice melts. Yeah. Yeah. And so that's an option.

I mean, sometimes, you know, heat tape is an option, uh, for some of those homes. Uh, they do have some more creative, uh, ventilation styles. They have edge vents that. can go up the roof, uh, about a foot or so, and, the air will, uh, uh, enter in, and it's all been wind tested for snow to come in. And, and so that's an option, uh, too. There are usually ways to, to, uh, mitigate things. So it's all a matter of, um, going there. So we go out with the blower door test and, and the visual inspection and, and, uh- Just make sure the home, isn't leaking air up into the living space if we're talking about a vented attic. Uh, if you have a bigger pitch, usually we can just correct that all, all in one shot. You can get the ventilation working properly. It's usually more the lower pitched ranches. They're, they're very difficult to work in because that pitch is so, tough, and the most critical detail is over in that low pitch area over by the soffit.

Uh, but we've had tremendous success and, and really sometimes if, if you've done all those things, in rare instances, I'm not a fan of it, uh, but we do have a powered vent that we could install that is eco-friendly, controlled by, uh, uh, an app on your phone, where we can, uh, actually have two stages to it. That excites me that it's not just on all the time and, and to really just...

If you get a little heat in that attic, you can turn that off and, uh, turn that on and get that heat out quick. So that is like, that is a parking b- uh, brake that we, uh, we can offer in rare instances that, that might be a fit. But normally I'm very against power vented, uh, fans because they're put in homes that are not air sealed. So as that turns on, it' doesn't have enough inflow from the soffit vents, so it's gonna. pull air from your living space-

Oh ... that you paid to heat or cool. Okay. And so that's why I'm generally not a fan of them. Uh, some states have kind of banned them on the, on the power end of it. Uh, the control is up in the attic, so you wanna go up there and turn a little dial and tell it when to come on, at what temperature.

You have to maintain it. The, the fan can, the, the motor can seize and all those. Be- before we run out of time here on this, su- suppose you're, uh, where we are here at WISL and you're considering a new roof. Uh, what, what's the best sequence for bringing in Wise Home Energy to kind of consult in this process to get it done right? I mean- Yeah ...

d- do you come and do you meet with the roofer and the homeowner? We- Is, is that a good approach? We certainly can. We wanna get there beforehand, and sometimes tying the two together is, is a challenge. Uh, I... There's some roofers that I've talked to, I'm like, "You guys understand this. You get it." Uh, there's times we've partnered with roofers that, um, where we're doing a hip roof and they were taking it off. In the corners you can't get to on a hip roof, and we just spray foam the four corners of the home and then treated the rest of it. So it, it is a good time. Sometimes we look at the home and say, "You know, you wanna work with a roofer that, uh, will put foam board down on the roof, and that's gonna be your insulation, and then you put the roof over the top of it." So there, there's another avenue, but it's not something that we would typically do. We just design it and, and refer it off to a roofer. So that's where the deck gets replaced? Pretty much, yeah. Yeah. And so you put your insulation up there, and now, the heat can't get through the, the roof deck and to melt the snow. So each w- each case needs to be, uh, well thought out, designed, and then put to the test. Let's blower door test it. Let's see if it, it, it' works properly. Oh, word to the wise from Wise Home Energy. Give them the contact information there.

Yeah. 585-270-5836. 585-270-5836. Don't be cold in your home. Pick up the phone and call Wise

Home Energy. Another Wise Home Energy program here' on The Voice of Liberty. Thanks for listening. Get the podcast. Yeah, it's available in podcast form at wysl1040.com.