How To Find A Leak In A Concrete Roof

Many homes today in various parts of the country are built with concrete and in floor radiant heating in concrete slabs and homes dating back to the 1950s as.

How to find a leak in a concrete roof. When you have a leak check your plumbing lines check for ponding and check the entire roof surface. Isolate areas when you run the hose. If you don t want to wait for rain to look for the leak try bringing the garden hose up on the roof. Roofers use a combination of visual inspection and moisture meters to scan membrane coated roofs to find the wet areas below the membrane and thus the probable leak point usually at a seam mechanical damage a roof penetration or at a roof drain.

Take a hose safely up onto your roof and spray the suspected area. Have a helper stationed in the attic with a flashlight looking for moisture. Follow damaged insulation back to the source of the roof leak. Pipe leaks within concrete i e slab leaks are identifiable with a thermal imaging camera but due to a variety of influential factors they aren t always identifiable unless you know what to look for and have the right tools.

This is less costly and labor intensive but the actual source of the leak might be somewhere else. One common practice when repairing roof leaks is to check and repair the area just above the leak. To check for sure you can use these tips. Be sure to start small.

See membrane single ply roofs. Don t go crazy with the water. Obviously we need to correctly identify precisely where the roof is leaking. It may be useful to expose the roof slab from underneath by removing part of the ceiling below to more accurately identify the point of water penetration.

Start low soaking the area just above where the leak appears in the house. Go inside and have a look to see whether water is. There might also be more than one source of the leak so just because you ve found one spot that doesn t mean it s the. Run the water over the place where you think the leak might be located.

The underside of your roof may be obscured by insulation and that s actually helpful for finding the roof leak. Do find the exact leak source. If a leak is difficult to find enlist a helper and go up on the roof with a garden hose.