A mammoth undertaking

It was pouring with rain overnight earlier in the week, and since I was awake anyway I got out of bed, found a torch, and had a good look at the porch roof in the downpour. I couldn’t see any signs of a leak, so I think (hope!) that problem is solved.

However, there is still clearly a separate problem with the porch, which is that it has no ventilation other than through the (usually closed) letterbox, and suffers badly from condensation. Some of that then drips from the roof onto the floor, which looks like a leak even though it isn’t. So I got back in touch with my now all-too-regular builder, and said I’d pay the remaining outstanding balance for fixing the porch roof the first time round, but wanted him to quote for a few more hopefully small jobs, including ventilating the porch.

Another job I want him to do is to re-route the outflow pipe from my boiler away from the gutter. I really do not want to have to keep going up a ladder in the snow, with a watering can of hot water and/or a hairdryer, to keep my boiler operating. It’s an unpleasant chore, and downright dangerous when it’s icy. I always made sure I had a mobile phone in my pocket so that if I slipped and fell I could at least call for help! It should be a simple job to route the pipe straight down the wall directly into a ground-level drain, which would be much easier to keep free of ice.

But when I invited the builder round to look at the pipe and quote for rerouting it, he pointed out that the brick-work below the offending gutter was distinctly damp. I said that he should have seen it during the snow – the entire wall was a sheet of ice from the overflowing gutter. I suspect that the down-pipe is blocked, and have asked him to try to pressure-wash it free. He’ll also get his roofer to have a poke around the roof and gutter, and check that there isn’t anything more serious going on. A blocked drain is bad enough, but I want to be sure there isn’t another underlying problem.

Yet more expense……. The thing is though that with an old house, there is always something that needs attention, and you really have to keep on top of the maintenance as otherwise problems can grow very big and nasty! So I’d much rather invest now in fixing ongoing problems as a series of smallish jobs than face a huge bill for replacing the roof or repointing entire walls…….