Frozen gutters often lead to bad news, and can cause irreversible damage to your roof and sidings.
Here are some suggestions for preventing gutters from freezing up when it gets cold during the winter:
- Clean gutters regularly
- Add an electric heating panel
- Use a quality gutter guard
- Insulate the roof
- Ensure gutters slope properly
- Remove snow using a roof rake
Icicles can cause a homeowner lots of trouble if it forms on rain gutters.
When water freezes, it expands, and this is subjecting the gutters to almost immediately warp and crack.
Ice dams forming on the roof will also cause big problems.
Snow that is melting and does not drain adequately creates puddles next to your foundation causing leaks into your basement and other issues.
The best way of preventing sledding damage from cold water is to prevent your gutters from freezing or icing up to begin with.
Why Do Gutters Freeze?
The gutters in the shade of trees are the most prone to freezing.
Over time, leaves and debris from trees accumulate.
This accumulation leads to water not flowing, eventually blocking your system. Once blocked, it is easy for water to collect in the gutter and freeze.
As you can see above, any snow or ice that is stuck also does not have the opportunity to flow out of the system when it thaws, so it may freeze and form a solid block in the gutter.
A gutter freezing may also be caused from snow or sleet accumulating.
If snow accumulates in the gutter and freezes before it is able to melt and drain properly, there may be some issues. This is typically in plenty of snow conditions.
Tips On How To Prevent Your Gutters From Freezing In Winter
1. Keep The Gutters And Downspouts Clean
The principal culprit causing your gutters and drains to freeze in the Winter is due to clogging.
Debris such as sticks and leaves build up and eventually cause dams.
Eventually, this will cause water to pond and freeze.
To Avoid This – make sure to clean your gutters every Fall so that leaves do not build up and clog your gutters once the snow begins to fall.
Particularly take care to monitor corners and junctions as these areas tend to collect more leaves.
Also, make sure that downspouts are cleaned. If the downspout does not drain, or gets clogged, your entire gutter will freeze.
2. Install A Heating Panel
If you’ve done everything possible and there’s still ice in your gutters, one alternative is to install a heating panel on the roof, with the wire running the length of the roof and downspouts.
When you turn on the panel, it produces heat, which will either melt the ice, or completely keep the gutters from freezing.
Works best: Before you decide to buy the heating panel, check out the reviews [of the product] on one of the major online retailers. A good set of reviews will help you find an effective product!
3. Install High-Quality Gutter Guards
Keeping debris out of your gutters is the most effective way to achieve blockage-free gutters and downspouts so that they do not freeze.
One way that you can keep debris out of your gutters is to use a high-quality stainless steel mesh gutter guard system.
When installed correctly, a gutter guard has a filtering effect on the roof. It filters out leaves, and debris from entering the gutter system, while allowing water to flow into the gutters.
By preventing blockages, the water stays flowing rather than turning to ice. They also serve as a physical barrier preventing snow from entering the gutter system and compacting in during winter.
And even Better – Some gutter guards come with heating elements that serve areas that experience winter weather, and keep ice and snow melting.
4. Add Insulation To The Roof
An overheated roof or attic melts off the snow that you have accumulated on top of your roof.
The melted snow runs down your roof and freezes at the edges which do not have a warm roof below.
As a result, the water expands and pushes up on the roof shingles, which creates damage to your shingles.
The solution to this problem is to insulate your attic. When your attic is insulated, it prevents heat from rising to your roof. You are warm on the inside, but your roof is cold.
Make sure to insulate all recessed lighting fixtures to keep the lighting from heating your attic.
It’s also best to ventilate the attic, so the air can circulate evenly to keep the roof at an even temperature.
5. Make Sure That Your Gutters Are Slopped
If the slope is very flat, your gutters will not function properly.
Water ultimately collects and remains in the gutter system, where it can expand and freeze in the winter months.
So, before the cold comes, check to see if your gutters are slopped.
Use a tape measure to measure from the bottom of your fascia board to the top of your gutter and write that down.
Continue to measure down your gutter until you reach the down spout.
Your measurements should incrementally increase from the start of your gutter to the downspout.
If they are increasing, you have a slopped gutter system. If they are not, you need to re-adjust your system to increase the flow of water.
6. Remove Snow
Using a roof rake – a long rake that can reach to the roof to clear snow from the ground safely – to remove snow will prevent snow from melting and refreezing in your gutters.
The sooner you remove snow from your roof, the sooner you can prevent ice dams from forming, especially if there is a substantial amount of snow.
Roof pitches of lower degrees can collect snow more readily, so again if your roof isn’t too steep, you may want to remove the snow from a flat roof sooner rather than later.
Why Is Gutter Freezing Bad?
It Puts Pressure On Your Roof
Frozen gutters can damage your roof in several ways.
Water expands when it freezes thus causing gutters to separate from the house and eventually falling to the ground.
There’s also the risk of frozen gutters being too heavy for the roof, potentially straining the roof’s load capacity.
Be careful! Heavy frozen gutters plus snow can cause roofs to collapse especially if the roof is aged or already weak.
Structural Instability Poses A Risk
Another danger that commonly occurs with frozen gutters is a direct threat to the structure of the house.
When the gutters are clogged or frozen, the water will find another way out, causing the water to run over the top of the gutters and run down the side of your house.
This leads to lack of stability in the walls or water pooling next to the foundation of the house.
This can lead to cracks in the foundation which will allow moisture into the house and lead to mold and flooded rooms if the correct preventive measures are not taken.
Gutters Are Broken
When rain gutters freeze, they are susceptible to damage.
The materials are not made to handle the expansion and contraction associated with the freezing process.
Specifically, seams and joints are the most susceptible. When water builds up above the frozen gutter, the material is even more prone to rust.
Roof Rot
Whenever wood is exposed to water, your roof will be at risk of damage as the underlayment and the structural materials under your roof will too be at risk of rotting.
Whenever you have wood structure that has begun rotting, it is not structurally sound anymore and could present a serious safety risk, especially during extreme winds or winter weather.
Great Tip – If you believe your roof has gotten wet below the shingles, please have your roof inspected as soon as possible by professionals.
Mold Can Grow Due To Indoor Humidity
Inadequate ventilation contributes in part to ice dams, which creates moisture in the attic, which is also an issue with a clogged gutter.
Mold can quickly develop in your attic presenting health and safety concerns.
Leaking Roof
If ice has formed in your gutters, when the snow melts on your roof, it has no place to go.
The moisture is pushed back and up under the shingles, potentially leading to leaks elsewhere in the house.
Water damage is hard to contain and costly to fix.
Insulation Could Be Harmed
When attic insulation gets wet it doesn’t hold up well, particularly over an extended period of time.
Like nearly everything else in your home, insulation is highly vulnerable to mold growth.
And it very quickly loses its insulating properties once wet. If your insulation has been wet, you should replace it as soon as feasible.
What Should You Do If Your Gutters Are Frozen Cold?
Use Hot Water Or Steam
If you can’t connect a hose to something with heated water, you’ll periodically be forced to load pots, pitchers, pots, etc. and dump into your rain gutters.
But that’s cumbersome and time-consuming.
So hiring a professional is absolutely the only certain way to melt the ice.
Many contractors have equipment that injects steam or hot water into your gutters and downspouts.
Heat Tape
If you’ve recently had light snow, heat tape can work to ‘heat’ the ice dam and cause it to melt.
With heavy snow, heat tape may cause the ice dam to rise up the slope of the roof, making it harder to manage.
Also, if your gutters are clogged with leaves or frozen solid, it causes heat tape to exacerbate the drainage issue.
So make sure that your gutters are clear of debris before proceeding.
Use A Chemical De-Icer
A different option you can consider is to add a chemical de-icer.
Introducing Magnesium Chloride De-icer into your gutter system is a suggestion.
If you see icicles forming in your gutters, use a small cup and sprinkle it in your gutters. It will help lessen the likelihood of freezing, ice formation, and snow accumulation in your gutters.
Just Remember – Do not use rock salt (sodium chloride) or other de-icing agents in your gutters. Table salt, Epsom salt, and sea salt are all corrosive to metal.
Additionally, the runoff through the downspouts is also detrimental to pets and plants because they are toxic to these animals and plants.
Use Your Hands
Finally, ice can be removed manually.
You may utilize a variety of hand tools, such as ice picks or an awl.
When you chip away at the ice, be careful not to damage the gutters or the roof tiles as you do so.
The only downside of this method is that you can’t remove the ice buildup from your downspouts.
Heads Up! Don’t try to use force. Please don’t break up the ice with a hammer or bat. That would do more harm than it would help.
Final Thoughts
To divert water from the home and away from the foundation, gutters are a critical home performance component.
When the gutters are not functioning properly, serious consequences, such as water damage, foundation/structural issues, mold and mildew, landscaping degeneration, etc., that you will need to deal with can arise.
Neglecting to address these issues could lead to serious, and costly repairs.
You should regularly clean your gutters to avoid leaves, twigs, pine needles, and debris from clogging the gutters.
If you do not, the roof runoff will freeze in the rain gutters.