My ceiling is leaking :(

I think I'm going to go insane with the sound of dripping!! My bedroom ceiling started leaking last week, estate builder came up and stuck some silicone glue stuff in a few gaps in the loft.

Tonight it's dripping rather rapidly, making a hole in the plasterboard I'm sat listening to all the drips coming off the roof onto the topside of the ceiling and just waiting for more drips to start.

I've got lunch boxes collecting the current drips and I can see myself running out of pots and pans!

Why can't the builders do a job properly the first time!! It rained loads when they were fixing and decorating the house before we moved in, surely there must've been drips then!!

My carpet is damp, there's damp patches appeared that weren't there when I left for work this morning!

The estate office will be seeing first thing tomorrow morning

Hmmm....last time I slept in a room that dripped half the ceiling fell down in the middle of the night!

Oh no! In your new house too? Hope you get it sorted quickly!

Just a suggestion, but it worked for my son. When we had a leaky ceiling he remembered something from a Bear Grills programme, where you put a drawing pin in the centre of the leak and drop a string from that into a bucket. The water then runs down the string and there's no dripping sounds. You just need to empty the bucket everyso often. And, yes, it really did work very well until we could get it all sorted out.

All the builder has done is make the job bigger now. Bet hes secretly called Barney Bodger. Dripping water is like some sort of torturous nightmare. I do hope your bed is not too near the part of the ceiling that is wet. Could be a bit dodgy.

Is your roof flat or pitched tile?

If its pitched with normal roofing tiles then no amount of silicone squirted from the loft will fix it because obviously a tile has slipped (common) or missing (get blown off in high wind).Other causes might be a incorrectly fixed/missing lead flashing or a ridge tile has become dislodged.Regardless though,anything built within the last 50 odd years should have roofing felt nailed underneath the tiles which is a secondary form of defence should you loose a tile and is also there as a vapour barrier.

If its a flat roof then leaks are very common,but can be everso simple to fix.Normally a £20 tin of liquid bitumen bought from a buillders merchant is ok for a quick temporary fix on mineral felt which needs applying from the outside,but shouldnt be regarded as a long term solution.

Steve (who used to be a roofer).

Argh! Damp-proofing a leak? He`s having a laugh, yes? Think of your electrics, for a start. I`d be calling the emergency number.

So, no builder turned up on Friday even though he told me he'd be up when I went to speak to him, so OH went in today and went one above the builder in the chain of command! She rang the builder and he sounded surprised that my ceiling is leaking!?!! I only spoke to him on Friday morning and he was up the week before!! Luckily, the receptionist cleared the matter and said I was in on Friday and she had seen me speaking to him and knew what I was there for as I stopped to speak with her!

Come this afternoon the plumber and a joiner arrived to have a look see! Luckily the plumber is a man of many talents and saw straight away what was wrong!! There was something wrong with the felt, it hasn't been put on properly, and there were a few coke bottle cap sized holes in the roof!!

They've done something temporarily in case it rains tonight, then will be up first thing in the morning to properly fix it!

Fingers crossed my leaky ceiling problems will be over!

Thanks for that Steve.....we have a flat roof over the ktichen extension and some of the flashing has allowed a tiny bit of water in just on the edge, only started last night so I will have to get up there......notice I said 'I' not hubby he's afraid of heights

So is my OH, you have my sympathies. We seem to be in competition with the neighbours over who can have the most tarpaulin covering up leaking roofs