Frozen Gutters And Downspouts

Although calgary has already had a taste of winter there s still time to clear your gutters and downspouts of fall leaves to that they can do their job of moving water runoff away from your home properly.

Frozen gutters and downspouts.

Before winter strikes adjust the slope of your gutters if needed. Before winter fully sets in it s important to ensure that your gutters and downspouts can handle melting snow and ice. Frozen downspouts can cause costly damage however consistently frozen or frozen solid downspouts may require immediate attention especially if weather conditions will be less than ideal for the foreseeable future. Unfortunately dealing with frozen gutters is rarely simple or inexpensive.

Here are some things you can do to prevent ice in gutters and downspouts. There are a few likely scenarios that can cause ice accumulation in downspouts. First resist the urge to go after the ice with a hammer or axe. The downspout is responsible for taking the water collected by the gutters and dispersing it out and away from the home s foundation.

Rain gutters should slope 1 2 inch for every 10 feet. Clogged gutters can be a serious hazard and can lead to the formation of ice dams along your roofline accelerating the freezing of your downspouts. It will cause your downspouts to freeze. If there is a large amount of snow on the ground that is covering the bottom mouth of the downspout.

While frozen gutters and downspouts may lead to water damage from ice dams or from gutters pulling away from the roof the solution can be as bad as the potential problems. Some say just leave it alone. If your gutters sit flat water will just sit in the gutter and freeze. Use heat tape or a heating panel system.

On line advice about frozen downspouts varies. Others recommend taking ice melt to the gutters see below a few say heat the gutters to clear them. Highly rated gutter pros tell our team that they see lots of damage in spring from homeowners who tried to remove winter ice with picks shovels or axes. Make sure your gutters are properly sloped.

When winter storms hit gutters and downspouts sometimes freeze into solid blocks of ice and homeowners understandably worry about gutters pulling away from the roofs or ice dams forming. That allows water to easily flow to the downspout. If you live in a colder part of the world you may run into a situation where your downspouts become frozen. Over time the ice may back up into your gutters themselves thereby creating extra weight on your entire guttering system.

Frozen downspouts occur during the winter during or after winter weather occurs.