Your roof won’t last forever (sadly). However, the life of your roof depends on a number of factors, including some factors you can control. Extending the life of your home’s roof means you’ll be able to go longer before you have to replace it, saving you money over the long run and headaches in case of damage due to deterioration. Here are a few methods to extend the life of your Cincinnati home’s roof.
Add Proper Insulation to Your Home
Adding proper insulation doesn’t just reduce your energy bills. It will extend the life of your roof, too. Even when you have poor ventilation in the attic, extra layers of insulation prevent the roof from warming up as much as it otherwise could. Then the ice and snow on your roof is less likely to melt. Liquid water sitting on your roof can allow water to seep through the shingles and eventually damage the structure. Good insulation reduces the temperature swings in the attic, too, so there is less thermal stress and damage to the underlying roof. Yes, adding insulation will extend the roof’s life in addition to saving you money on your utility bills each month.
Ensure Proper Roof Ventilation
Good ventilation will extend the life of your roof, though many don’t appreciate its impact. If you have a fan in the attic circulating air, the attic won’t become much warmer than the roof, minimizing how much the ice and snow on top of it could melt and cause water damage. You’ll dramatically reduce the risk of ice dams forming, in which melting water is trapped against the roof, held securely in place by the ice and snow itself, eventually backing up under your roof’s surface and doing long-term damage.
You’ll enjoy the benefits of good roof ventilation in the summer, too. If you have dark-colored roofing material, it can absorb heat that is transferred to the attic. You could end up with an attic that is hotter than both the interior and exterior of your home. The obvious impact is the need to run your air conditioner longer and harder than you would if you had an attic fan circulating the air. However, the very high temperatures could also cause warping of the plastic layers of the roofing membrane or curling of the roof shingles.
Another significant benefit is the reduction in humidity in the attic (especially important if there have been ice dams or water leaks). You’ll have less mold and mildew in the attic with good ventilation — but you still need to have the water leaks located and fixed. Proper ventilation in the attic also allows moisture created inside the home to escape instead of collecting in the attic, eventually causing a host of problems including rotting out your support beams. A side benefit of removing this moisture is that it can’t condense in your attic insulation and reduce its efficiency. This is another area where extending roof life saves you money on monthly energy bills, too.
Reducing the temperatures in your attic can reduce the temperature on your roof, too — don’t let the shingles get so hot that they flip up or warp, because the only solution at that point may be a roof replacement.
Clean Your Roof
It often doesn’t occur to people that they need to clean their roof unless there is something obviously wrong. For example, you need to remove tree branches and leaves that collect in roof valleys, since these can interfere with the flow of water away from the roof and cause damage over time. In theory, heavier debris could damage the shingles, especially if blown around by the wind. If you don’t have gutter guards in place, the gutters need to be cleaned regularly so that your roof doesn’t become water damaged on the lower deck board.
Asphalt shingles in particular are prone to algae growth, because the algae feed off the limestone particles in the shingles. You want to regularly clean off the algae, because the moisture they contain will eventually deteriorate the shingles. If you have asphalt shingles, the growth of algae will literally eat away your shingles. If there are no granules left on your shingles, the roof will need to be replaced.
If algae are growing in the gutters and downspouts, it could clog it, too. Note that the same thing is true when you have moss and fungi growing on your roof. If unaddressed, this will lead to wood rot. Why? Because moss likes to grow in the sheltered slots between shingles, it holds moisture in the last place water can evaporate and keeps it close to where it could damage the wood.
In the case of moss and lichen, the plants’ ability to hold moisture means they will cause problems even if the plants die. This is because their roots dig into the shingles and tiles, and when the plants freeze, it will cause even more damage. Once the shingles are brittle, the roof will need to be replaced regardless of its age.
Improve the Drainage of Your Roof
Water is the enemy of your roof. Anywhere water collects, it can seep into the roof and start to break down the structure of the roof. There are simple solutions to this such as having gutters to remove water from the roof as quickly as possible. A side benefit of a good gutter system is that it prevents the water from cutting into the soil near your foundation or pooling there, minimizing the chance of foundation damage, too.
Cincinnati Roof Replacement Is Inevitable, But …
While all roofs need to be replaced at some point, adding years to the life of your roof will save you money. It reduces the need for costly repairs, and if you double the life of your roof, you’ve cut the cost of such repairs in half when factored over its lifetime. Contact a trusted, local roof repair company like all of us here at Harper Siding and Roofing today for a free roofing estimate here in Cincinnati.