Flat Roof Watch

Meteorologists often forecast rain, snow, wind, and sometimes even sunshine. They should add to their repertoire 'acorn showers'. With our MCM under a huge 50 year Pin Oak tree, we must succumb to the seasonal fall showers. It starts with the paradrop of caterpillars in the spring and ends in the winter as it drops its canopy slowly through fall and winter. In the beginning of fall we roller skate across our driveway as the Oak tree bombard acorns everywhere. All this proves to be bad news for our flat roof.

Current conditions indicate heavy acorn dropping patterns followed by repetitive roof brooming with potential slippage and irritation. The great shade our house enjoys comes at a cost. A couple of months have gone by since the roof repair band aid was done, so I decided to see how it was fairing. I had already gotten up a couple weeks ago to sweep the water and then 'baby' acorns off the roof and install some drain strainers.

We had some rain a maybe a little over a week ago, and there were only a couple of small puddles left on the band-aid area. A couple hundred acorns lay scattered across the roof. The strainers were surrounded by acorns aching to get in the drain lines. About this time every year we get a drain clog in our utility room during a rain storm. When unclogged a ton of acorns come shooting out the drain. Apparently our roof drain, exterior drain, and interior utility room drain all tie into the same line.

Operation 'keep acorns out of drains' has been in operation for almost two weeks. A quick sweep and drain cleaning had everything on the roof cleared off and dry. It has to be a humorous sight to see someone sweeping off their flat roof. Our patch job has proved to keep it dry with no sight of any water penetration inside. Dreaming of tapered insulation and no pools of water on my roof has not yet come to fruition. Future forecast calls for acorn showers to lighten up and flat roof homeowners a final sweep of relief.