Tin Ceiling / Roof Leak
On Sunday during remnants of Henri we noticed a few drops of water come down from our ceiling (we are on top floor of brownstone). Odd because we had roof fully replaced 3 years ago and since then have never had leaks in any previous rainstorms or over winter (and it did not continue to leak, seemed to stop before rain stopped). Also the placement of leak was strange. It was in middle of ceiling, close to a skylight but not coming from the skylight and we have a sloped ceiling and water was not showing up at bottom of slope. Two questions:
1. Does anyone have tips for doing roof leak check themselves (we have hose connection on the roof)? And because we don’t have an attic would this even work? There is no crawl space / cock loft between our ceiling and roof but I still imagine it takes long time for water to work way through if it’s just a small leak.
2. I can’t exactly see source of leak because we have a modern tin ceiling from American Tin Ceilings (snap lock model), and I assume drywall behind that. Their recommendation for removing panels is to start from last p anel installed and work way backwards but I didn’t do original install so not sure where that is. The leak is close to molding around skylight so could remove that and start from there. Anyone ever worked with this product before and have any tips for removing just a few panels to see where the leak could be coming from?

Guest User | 3 years and 8 months ago
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cate | 3 years and 8 months ago
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Skylights typically admit a few drops of water during extremely heavy rainstorms. This is considered a feature not a bug.

anotherposter | 3 years and 8 months ago
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Once the water gets in, it will follow routes we can’t see in the ceiling and walls-along framing, pipes, wires. It often finds it way to view around light fixtures. We had a yankee gutter that turned out to be the cause of a leak showing up not on the roof level, but one and two levels down from there. On one level, it would come out at a light fixture and on the other from an access door in the ceiling–paths of lease resistance.

RobertGMarvin
in General Discussion 3 years and 8 months ago
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I don’t know if it’s possible to check the location of a roof leak from inside because water can travel along horizontal surfaces before coming through the ceiling. It’s better to have a roofer inspect the roof from the outside.

helen40
in General Discussion 3 years and 8 months ago
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Have you checked the bathroom and kitchen vent(s)? We have a new roof, too, and it is sealed tight, including around the roof hatch and new skylights. In the last two giant storms, there was enough rain and wind to push water down the vents which eventually leaked through a top floor high hat (which I assume is a low point) and also through the bathroom fan one floor down.
I need to buy new caps for all of the vents which are now open (some have caps already) and clean out the wet crap that I am sure is in the cockloft above the top floor tin ceiling.
Good luck