Even though I love my new front door, I rarely use it. So yesterday it was a bit of a surprise to see the dagger-like icicles hanging from the front porch. Winter requires a lot of outdoor maintenance–you’ve got the shoveling, the cleaning of the car, the salting of the walkways and now, apparently, the clearing of killer ice spears that threaten all who visit. Icicles mean what? Leaking heat? Lame roof sealing?
And here’s a sneak peek at my afternoon job:
Girl Meets House 
Leaky heat is definitely the culprit. And from the size of those cicles, you’ve got some kind of leak! There are lots of options for insulating, but one of the easiest is to rent a blow-in insulation machine and blow in insulation into the attic space. You should have at least 12″ of insulation up there. Older homes rarely had sufficient insulation – some built in the early 1900s have virtually no insulation whatsoever. There was definitely a period in American history around say 1965 where energy was so cheap, it was better just to spend the money on heat rather than buy extra insulation, so lots of houses are under-insulated.
I always thought they were just from snow melting a bit, then refreezing as it trickles off the roof. Like in our area everyone gets them because we may be freezing a bunch for a few days, then we will get a day that is warmer than normal, then boom! Icicles galore. 🙂
yeah, meg, it’s heat leaking out a seam….mostly you just live with ’em, esp. if they’re off a porch as yours are. when i break ’em off our porch and throw ’em, tuck finds ’em because they’ve our scent on them….like personalized ice cubes, his favorite snack.
liked the blog on “words”–and never thought of reversing my books to see only parchment, and don’t think i ever will do it….at any rate, it’s a beautiful but cold sunday morning so we’re waiting a bit more heat before we take the dogs snowshoing…
ya – I’ve got the icicles too…hate the thought of wasting heat!! Especially at these prices!! Although we just had some furnace problems and our house was at 80 degrees ALL DAY…too HOT!!! And we had to shut the whole furnace down…great!
Lovin’ the new home-ownership! xoxo-ab
Yep – Heat as has been said. What you want is a cold attic. Seems contrary doesn’t it. You want insulation to keep the heat in the house but you want the temp above the insulation to be the same as the outside temp. This minimizes the melting and subsequent re-freezing. So, in addition to adding insulation to the floor of the attic you also want to make sure its well ventilated. Look around at houses. Some will have snow on the roofs, some will not. The houses with no snow of their roofs are the ones with little or improper insulation. Look at your own roof, see areas with no snow and some with snow? That could maybe clue you into where issues may be.
Oh, and if you have any home improvement or DIY questions just let me know at http://www.handyguyspodcast.com