Ice melt for gutters11/6/2023 ![]() Those are the ones with really good insulation, but unfortunately those are the ones experiencing more weight, so it’s a double-edged sword.”Ĭhris Pasten, owner and operator of Clear Point Home Inspections in Garfield Ridge, said leakage is usually a sign of a faulty roof but agreed it’s not wise for homeowners to try and address the issue by themselves. “If you can keep the attic cold by keeping the heat contained in the house, you’ll see houses with more snow on the roof. “Melting happens because a lot of warm air moves up into the attic space and melts everything that’s on the other side of the roof. ![]() “The biggest thing is to improve the insulation inside the house,” he said. ![]() Hughes said to avoid ice dams, residents need to make sure their homes are properly insulated. Hughes agreed, saying it’s too dangerous. He urged residents not to go atop their roofs for fear of falling off, hitting a soft spot or falling through a vent. “You don’t know what’s under that snow,” Matt Beaudet, commissioner of the city’s buildings department, said Monday. You can also put heat tape on the roof, but you’re going to want to address the insulation when you can.”Īs for heavy snow on roofs, city officials and industry professionals say it’s not worth the risk for people to remove it themselves. “You can buy ice melt pucks that you can put up on your roof, and they would start to do bulk melting of the ice. “There’s a couple things you can do right now,” Hughes said. He also said he will have a roofer come out when the weather is a little better to evaluate if any damage occurred. Small said he was advised to reposition some of his gutters and is considering having electric cables installed in his eaves and near downspouts to melt ice. “If that ice melts it’s going to come toward the gutters and the gutters will be frozen solid and that water will back up under the shingles and floods underneath the roof area, so a lot of people will have leakage along exterior walls.” “If the temps warm up in the next few days, you’ll see a lot of severe melting and you’ll see ice damming and other things happening inside the houses,” Hughes said. On the other hand, ice dams can tear off gutters, loosen shingles and cause water to back up and pour into the house, Hughes said. ![]() Earlier this month, the historic Aragon Ballroom experienced a partial collapse, and multiple vacant buildings across the South Side collapsed this week. With so much snow and such cold temperatures, older structures may buckle under the weight, Hughes said. Hughes said homes with a lot of ice usually indicate poor insulation, while having a lot of snow on the roof is a sign of good insulation. Of course, then you need to get up on the ladder, and that can be hazardous.” An awning sags after Chicago was pummeled with snow and ice. “You’re better off if you can get something up on the roof to melt the ice and let them fall on their own. “Try not to break off because it can be a massive amount of weight, and, depending on how they are attached, they can take part of the structure down with them,” said Mark Hughes, owner of home inspection company Domicile Consulting. And they fear the weight of the snow on their roofs could cause structural damage or collapse, and icicles will fall and hurt people below.Įxperts warn there is a right and wrong way to handle snow and ice from rooftops. Homeowners across the city are also worried ice dams will cause costly damage to their homes. The whole debacle ended up costing the family more than $1,000. He then found a Minnesota-based company that specializes in ice dams and had crews working in Chicago. Small tried to fix it by turning down the temperature in his home and using an ice-melt product on the ice. “When we looked into it, we realized the water on the roof cannot run off because the roof has these big blocks of ice that formed over the last few weeks.” Credit: Icicles in Jefferson Park “We had a leak in our roof because a lot of ice had built up right near some flashing,” Kenneth Small said. BEVERLY - Kenneth and Adair Small have lived in their Beverly home for a decade and never had an issue with snow and ice - until this winter.Īs Chicago was bombarded with snow over the past three weeks, along with frigid temperatures that did not allow any snow to melt, ice dams formed on their roof and trapped water from draining, causing it to eventually seep into their 100-year-old home.
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