Skip to main content
Huff N Puff Schenectady Schenectady

How Ice Dams Form & How You Can Reduce Them

By October 22, 2014No Comments

With winter just around the corner, most Albany residents have already dealt with things like shoveling snow off the driveway, scraping frost off their windshields and wrestling against the build-up of ice dams on their roofs.

Ice dams are one of the most troublesome roofing problems we need to deal with during winter. They don’t just LOOK threatening, they actually ARE. Ice dams are notoriously known to compromise roofing performance and longevity; and can put even your home’s structural integrity at great risk.

But what causes ice dams and how can we reduce them? Huff ‘N Puff, the top provider of gutter protection systems in Albany, explains:

As the temperature begins to drop, most homeowners will probably crank up their heaters to feel warm in their homes. But when the heat inside your house rises to the attic, this will warm up the roof and consequently melt the snow sitting on top of the roof. The melted snow (or slush) will naturally cascade down the slope of the roof but, when it hits the edge of the roof and the gutter (both of which will still be cold), the water will refreeze and solidify at the roof’s edges. This will cause an ice “dam” that collects water, which can in turn damage the shingles and underlayment and leak into your home, causing further damage inside.

Many homeowners resort to hacking off these ice dams with axes and picks, but this practice can spell danger, obvious reasons. Some homeowners install heat cables along the edges of their roofs, but those too, can be unsafe. They can also be quite an eye sore.

What, then, could be a better alternative? Huff ‘N Pull, experts in gutter protection in Albany, offer a new and effective solution for your ice dam problems. Click here <part-2 URL> to view part 2 of our blog, which talks about this amazing product.