Recommendations for preventing roof gutter downspouts from freezing over?

Both of our downspouts are completely solid blocks of ice right now.
I know there are heat cables that you can feed down the downspout to prevent this.
Anyone have any experience to share on the topic? Do they work or is there something better out there?
Thanks in advance!

stickerhappy

in General Discussion 8 years and 5 months ago

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oliver_nyc | 8 years and 5 months ago

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I recently had this done and with the recent snow and freezing rain it seemed to help with ice dams, etc. I bought the cable from amazon and had jon wickers (jonwickers.com) do the installation – very reasonable and quick job. well worth it.

BSDOD | 8 years and 5 months ago

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Yes the wires work, they also help with preventing ice dams

anotherposter | 8 years and 5 months ago

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We put the cables along the “gutter” on the back of our roof so that the snow/ice there melts and keeps the stuff going down the drainpipes from freezing. We were having other work done so it wasn’t too hard to run that–it’s wired into the roof/attic space and we have a switch for it on the top floor. We were getting the frozen drainpipes before and haven’t since.