What a bummer, 3katz. I hope the problem is resolved post haste and you can enjoy your weekend.

The roof of my Dutch Colonial in the Cities is very pitched, so I don't have any. However, I'm in awe of the killer icicles on my neighbors' house. I don't know if they are having trouble inside. Many people are desperately trying to find someone to rake their roof. One guy just said a local company is charging $475/hour and it takes about 4-5 hours. Ugh! Terrible winter.

Ya it’s a nasty problem and I’m not too sure how to fix the underlying cause in this house. I need to confer with a timber timber frame construction expert to try to figure it out.

One place I called had a voicemail quoting something like $475 per hour, two hour minimum. Fortunately the people coming out are a bit less than that but it won’t be cheap in any case. Cheaper than fixing water damage inside your house.

The people doing the ice removal also have a preventive roof snow removal service that I think I will sign up for. They “rake” every time it gets to a certain depth.

So I’m sitting here by the fire with my cats, drinking coffee and waiting for these guys to arrive. Later I’ll go out and do a little shoveling for exercise. This is our fourth snowiest February on record and it’s only the 16th.

A removal service sounds like your best bet. In the past, we've found that the only thing that works is getting the load off before it builds up and before this time of year when the sun gets stronger and starts that melting process. We got out of the habit with last year's lack of snow and just realized we haven't kept up with this years monstrous snow. I've heard stories of the heating coils placed on roofs starting fires, so we have nixed that idea.

Good luck with getting it removed. We are heading to our cottage tomorrow to rake - it has an almost flat roof so it's really important we get it off, but it's only one story so we can do it ourselves.

We had this problem two years in a row. An electrician came and installed heat tape at our house in the areas where we were having the trouble. It's basically, like, some wires on the roof with a sensor that turns them on when it senses it needs to and it melts all the snow and ice off in the problem places. We haven't had a problem since the heat tape was installed. Maybe an option for you ?

I did some investigation of the heating cable/tape and it seems there’s a lot of opportunity for it to not work well. I’m going to try the snow removal service and see how that works. Watching these guys standing on my steep icy roof scares the heck out of me....

We've had a problem with snow buildup in the past, but have been lucky to not have ice dams start. We live here full time, which helps, and DH is pretty diligent about keeping on top of it for the most part. We have a roof rake, which also helps, and also have the heat coils, which haven't quite helped yet because for various reasons DH hasn't installed them yet. So no report on that, but hopefully they'll get installed this year. He wants to build a frame for them which would make it easier to take them down every spring.

We've gotten a lot of snow here in a very short time and have a weird unique situation in that we have a detached garage and a covered walkway to the house. If the conditions are right, ice builds up in the gutters and downspouts and starts dripping on the deck in front of the patio door we usually use to get in and out. Then it freezes. Yesterday DH hot mopped it, and then dried it.

Oh, and hey. It just started snowing again. Fun times.

When the heat tape first came out, people were exited about it. As katz said, however, it just doesn't work well in our climate. I don't hear of anyone using it anymore.

I’ve been analyzing the situation today. I can see exactly where my roof heat loss is occurring. It’s not the big vaulted area over the living room but the section over the loft and another upper area. There is no attic access here but it does seem there is some kind of “cavity” between the sloped roof and the interior ceiling/walls. I’m trying to find someone with the expertise necessary to figure it out. I’m thinking of one of those cameras you can stick in through a hole and see what’s behind the walls/ceiling. It does seem like maybe something can be done since there looks to be some space between the roof/walls and not just the full vaulted ceiling. The joys of home ownership....

Wow! I have never lived anywhere that gets this bad in the winter. I was born in California but now live in TX. I cannot imagine having to deal with these problems in the dead of winter. My hat is off to all of you. stay warm!

Ya I got an upper body and cardio workout shoveling the ice and snow they removed from the roof off my deck. I made somewhat of a dent in this pile which was a bit of an iceberg from the steam they used to melt the ice. I always prefer to get my exercise doing something useful vs just exercising to exercise.