<p>Thinking of purchasing one. Need the snow off a certain area of hte roof to prevent ice damming. </p>
<p>Longer pole better?</p>
<p>No, it’s much easier to prevent ice dams by using those heating wires that melt the ice from the bottom–just set them up before snow season. </p>
<p>Back when we lived in Massachusetts, we had ice dams one year (our last year there: 11 snow storms with more than ten inches, a quarter-mile of dirt driveway to plow, a house that was prone to ice dams… I was glad to get out). We hadn’t put up the wires at the beginning of snow season, there were feet of compacted ice-snow on the roof. I plugged a snow-melt cable into an extension cord, tied a ball to the end, and threw it over the roof, left it there for an hour. That melted one spot. I did that repeatedly all day until there were nice melted paths under the ice on the roof and no more ice dams.</p>
<p>We have both. If you can keep the snow from piling up, there is less chance that it will melt and create the ice damming that caused so much damage last year. </p>
<p>We the areas that we know about.</p>
<p>Ours has a telescoping handle so it can be longer…or shorter.</p>
<p>We get those damn dams every year. Our rake has one of those telescoping handles, too, so we can reach the problem areas. I need to try those heating wires in the gutters, as ice will also build up there.</p>
<p>We get snow “cornices” instead of dams - as a result of having a slate roof. Houses with slate roofs have snow sliding off rather than covering the roof as other houses do. Typically, you will see the slate roofs bare on the upper half, with the snow cover sliding down as a solid sheet, covering the upper walls. We have little protruding things on the front roof that are supposed to break the sheets up, but they don’t work that well.</p>
<p>If you get really awful ice dams, fill old sweatsox with ice melt (calcium chloride) and throw them up behind the dams. Breaks em up like a charm. Tie a rope to the sock so you can get it down after the dam is gone!</p>
<p>We put ice melt in old knee socks (can you tell we keep EVERYTHING) and this worked well also…to melt the ice. We had to rake off the snow first.</p>
<p>I use two of them with five sections (each rake has three sections) as our roofs are pretty high off the ground. This past year was brutal as we had storm after storm after storm and on our front roof, I was more concerned about the amount of weight on the roof than I was about ice dams (never had ice dam issues on the front roof).</p>
<p>You need some amount of arm strength to manipulate something so long from a distance and you can get a pretty good upper-arm workout from raking the roof.</p>
<p>Just a note of hope - we had far fewer problems with ice dams when we upgraded our gutters to six inch width.</p>
<p>Snow rakes can help a little, but there is no way for you to rake anything but the lowest level of your roof.</p>
<p>Ice dams are not well understood. They happen when there is a lot of snow on the roof, and when there are persistent subfreezing daytime temperatures. They happen because heat rises inside your attic from your house, lights, exhaust fans, etc, and slowly melts the bottom of the snow at the top of the roof. That trickles down the roof until it hits the part of the roof that is the “overhang”. At that point, the roof is not warm, and the trickling water re-freezes, eventually forming a dam.</p>
<p>Ways of preventing this are: 1. Heat the overhang of the roof so the melted trickling can make it over the gutter. 2. Insulate the upper attic roof from underneath so that the melting of the snow does not take place from the bottom. 3. Put ice melting chemicals on the lower part of the roof (after raking so you can get to it). This can discolor the roof and isn’t recommended, but I think it works. </p>
<p>I also think that an exhaust fan placed in the attic vent could help by drawing in the cold air and exhausting the warm air that is causing the melt, but I’ve never heard anyone agree with that. </p>
<p>There are bunches of websites that discuss this problem, but it seems no one ever reads them, including (especially) contractors.</p>
<p>The rakes only cost about 50 dollars or so. If you use a longer extension, pay very careful attention to where you are relative to your power lines. There are plenty of electrocuted people who were holding long conductive poles just a few moments earlier.</p>
<p>dadx - your description of how ice dams form is right on. You also have the right idea with an exhaust fan … although the fan itself may not be necessary. The idea is to keep the air in the attic at the same temperature as the outside air. Improving the insulation in the attic helps prevent the heat inside the house from rising into the attic, and the vents in your eaves and roof are designed to help keep outside air moving in the attic so that heat doesn’t get trapped. On some roofs (mine included), heavy snow can block the vents … so that causes trouble.</p>
<p>Thanks for all the great information you all provided.</p>
<p>Can someone tell me more about the heating wires? Sounds like we should use those and the snow rake!</p>
<p>The area we have all the problems with is the corner of the den, with it’s pitched roof, at right angles to the kitchen. The den area extends past the rest of the house so that area is first floor so easier to reach than the rest of the house would be.</p>
<p>For anyone who is interested, there is a great deal of good information on ice dams on this site:</p>
<p>[BSD-135:</a> Ice Dams — Building Science Information](<a href=“http://www.buildingscience.com/documents/digests/bsd-135-ice-dams]BSD-135:”>http://www.buildingscience.com/documents/digests/bsd-135-ice-dams)</p>
<p>Maybe the heating wires aren’t the way to go. I just read several articles warning of fire dangers. Guess I’ll stick with my rake and try the calcium chloride sock trick, which was recommended by This Old House and MADad.</p>
<p>I’ve used a garden rake to get snow away from the gutters that are over the garage- needed to stand on a ladder due to the height of the garage (floor much lower than house). Therefore never bothered buying an extra, single purpose tool.</p>
<p>We bought a snow rake last year. It helped on the S. side of the house where the sun finished the job. On the north side of the house we have a heating wire. My concern about a snow rake is that too much use may be rough on the shingles.</p>
<p>OT - for those of us who just endured the hottest, driest summer on record, can we just say how nice it is to hear that other weather conditions exist?</p>
<p>Off to dig up my dead shrubs and try to re-finance my water and electric bills…</p>