My patio door is leaking into my living room. There is an ice dam on the outside where the top of the door frame meets the siding of the house. I removed the top trim on the door frame and the wood behind the trim is soaked.

I have two questions:

1) Would a hair dryer work to remove the ice dam since it can be reached easily? Or would melting it make matters worse?

2) Is the likely cause of this poor insulation around the door frame or a problem where the outside of the door frame meets the siding?


Above the right side of the door is where the leak is.



Closer view of the leaking area.



View from the outside.



Closer view.



Closeup of the ice dam.

 

Your door is leaking because water isn't supposed to be getting behind your siding, and that leak is originating from your roof/overhang/fascia.

The best thing to do is clear as much snow as you can off of the ice dam on your roof, then hook up a hose to your hot water and melt a few paths through the ice on your roof so that water coming down the roof has a way to drain away.

BTW, none of your images loaded... maybe because they seem to be linked to your email account. If you can correct the links we'll take a look.

 

Thanks for the reply. I realized after I posted the pics that the link to my email probably wouldn't work (even though they show up when I preview my post).

Let's try it again.

 

You have to correct your inadequate ventilation under the roof and remove any fiberglass insulation (in the ceiling and the wall) that might POSSIBLY have ANY moisture, since fiberglass does not really dry out in place without air flow and movement.

Take off the upper vinyl siding and look at the flashing around the door and make sure it is under your primary moisture barrier (not vapor barrier).

A properly installed door or window should not leak, but shed the water down over the moisture barrier. The majority of windows are not installed properly, so it is not a new problem.

Dick

 

Yeah, its quite likely that since the picture that was taken from the inside, shows wet studs on top of the door, it's likely wet behind the drywall all the way to the ceiling. If that's the case, you have water coming down over your wall top plate. The top plate is the top board of your wall framing. The rafters sit on top of the top plate. What's likely happening is that water is damming up along your roof edge, getting behind your fascia, and then it gets into the wall framing and behind your cedar siding.

Best way to stop it is like I said before, to scoop snow, and melt some pathways for drainage w/hot water.

I've been installing doors and windows for 20 years and this, to me, looks like an ice dam problem on the roof, not a problem with the door installation. Not many door/window installations can handle water that gets behind the housewrap or felt paper due to an ice dam.

Of course, if the installers cut off the nailing fin, then.... Houston, we have a problem.

 

Thanks for the replies. It's going to be tough getting the snow off the roof. The house is built into a hill. The patio door leads out to a deck which is above a walk-out basement. The deck doesn't extend out far enough for me to get a good angle with my roof rake so I can't get at the snow on the roof. And if I stand in the backyard outside the basement, the rake isn't long enough to get at the roof.