Your roof is not one continuous surface. It is layers of overlapping protection with formed metal closing every joint, seam, and penetration. That metal is the flashing, and it is doing the hardest work on the roof. A leaking skylight, chimney, vent pipe, or wall transition is usually a flashing problem rather than a roofing problem.

At KPost Company our flashing repair covers every location on a residential roof, from drip edge at the eave to curb flashing at a skylight. The metal is formed in our own sheet metal shop, which means a piece that has to match an odd existing condition gets made to fit rather than approximated out of stock trim.

If you have an active leak or want it checked before the next storm, our roof leak detection team can trace it, and repair and maintenance can keep the rest of the roof ahead of it.

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Key Takeaways

  • Flashing is metal, and metal is what makes a joint watertight. Shingles and membrane handle the open field of a roof. Every place the roof stops or changes direction, a chimney, a wall, a valley, a vent, a skylight, is closed with formed metal. Sealant alone in those places is a repair with a short clock on it.
  • Most roof leaks are flashing leaks. A roof that is leaking is usually leaking at a termination or a penetration rather than in the middle of a field of shingles. That is why a leak call starts at the flashings.
  • Each location needs its own type of flashing. Step flashing at a sloped wall, counterflashing over it at masonry, valley flashing where two planes meet, kickout at the bottom of a wall run, drip edge at eaves and rakes, boots at pipes, and curbs at skylights. Substituting one for another is a common and expensive shortcut.
  • The kickout is the piece most often missing. Where a roof plane runs into a sidewall and ends, a kickout diverts water away from the wall instead of into it. Left out, the damage shows up inside the wall cavity rather than on the ceiling, which is why it goes unnoticed for years.
  • Material choice has to account for what the metal touches. Copper against aluminum or bare steel sets up galvanic corrosion. Flashing material gets matched to the adjacent metals and to the roof covering, not chosen on price alone.