Hi, this is Steve from Roofer 911.
I'm on a roof in Fairfax, Virginia. This homeowner has a leak inside the valley and the leak is right down in this area here. She's had this valley replaced 2 different times and the leak keeps coming back. What the contractors did was they removed the shingles on both sides of the valley, then they installed ice and water shield right down the middle and they re-shingled it.
Being that the leak is in the valley, the first thing I wanted to check was the overall installation and it was done perfectly, so the valley is not the source of the problem. Instead, you have a ridge vent here and then there's another ridge vent at the very top of the roof right over here.
That ridge vent here is about 40 feet above where they see the leak inside. The reason why the ridge vent is a problem is because there's an open breathing space underneath this Cobra ridge vent and they cut the open space too wide, so what we need to do to both ridge vents is remove the cap shingles, take off the ridge vent itself, and then we're going to close off the breathing space a little bit.
This way, there's about a 3 inch total open space. Then we're going to re-install the ridge vent and put on the cap shingles. This only leaks when there's a driving rain coming towards the side of the house or towards the front. Once that's taken care of, then the ridge vent is good.
Another problem is, and this is very common and I see this all the time, is right here. Right at the keys where the shingles join together there's nails exposed. What we need to do is we need to lift every shingle on both sides of the valley. Any nails that are exposed at the key we're going to shield the nail with polyurethane and then we're going to slide a piece of aluminum step flashing underneath and then we'll reseal that shingle again.
As I said, both sides of the valley, but also all the way up to the top of the roof because a leak can originate from any place on both sides of the valley and above. Then the water just travels down the roof and wherever the water finds an opening, like say through the side of a nail or maybe a tear in the felt, that's where the water will settle.
Once all these procedures are done, this leak is permanently stopped. If you have any questions, my name is Steve from Roofer 911 and I can be reached at 703-475-2446. Thank you.
Roofer911 provides roof repair services in Fairfax Virginia, and all areas of Northern Virginia.
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