Summer is finally here in the greater Portland area which means it’s important to be thinking about the components of your roof. The component that has the most difficulty dealing with the summer heat is your (rubber) pipe flashings. Your pipe flashings typically last 10-15 years, but because most homeowners have rubber pipe flashings, instead of lead, they fail due to the heat of summer and cold of winter.
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I want to talk a little bit about pipe flashings on a roof. This is an architectural composition three-tab and this is a two-inch pipe flashing that’s ventilating probably a tub, more than likely a tub on a two-inch and this is a no-caulk pipe flashing. You can see this is 12-14 years old and this pipe flashing is bad. So during hard rain water is going to run down right into the building and this just lets water in there. Not a good thing. We’ll replace these on homes and we look for them all the time for being bad. We’ll pull this whole unit out, put a new one in and you’re good for another 15 years. A permanent solution would be a lead pipe flashing that fits over the top of this with a cap. It would be a permanent solution, though some clients opt not to do that and want to go the least expensive method which is putting a new one of these on. Again, this is an example of a failed pipe flashing this would be the cause of a leak.
When was the last time you had your pipe flashings inspected? Contact Roof Life of Oregon to have one of our roof consultants provide you with an inspection and a full report on your entire roof. Call us at (503) 461-2665 or submit an estimate form.