water leaking through bedroom ceiling. What can this be?

Hedylogos

okay, so i have noticed above my bedroom door, where there is a long slim crack, there is water dripping slowly through because of the rain we're getting at the moment. what could this be? would it be something that is easily fixable? sorry, my parents are away on holiday and the only option i have is to either check it or call someone out and the latter may cost money depending on the issue, so i would rather DIY it, but i don't know the first thing about fixing a leaked roof, or whatever it may be. Anybody encountered this problem before, and can you shed light on what may be the issue just so i know whether it will cost money to bring someone out or whether it's fixable by doing it myself.

wallbash

Get into the loft ?
Check out the roof............ don't turn on any lights , see if you see any daylight.
Then turn on any loft light or use a torch
IF the loft is NOT boarded out, dont do anything.
Putting your foot thru a ceiling will be far more costly than any small leak


DON'T Panic

Snakey

It's unlikely that you will be able to "fix" this, so lower your expectations! The best you can realistically hope for is to limit the damage it's doing by, if you can, locating the leak in the loft and putting a bucket under it.

If in any doubt, wait for your parents to get back. As wallbash says, putting your foot through the ceiling will do far more damage than a week's worth of further leaking - especially if it's only happening when it rains (i.e. if it's not coming from the water tank). And if you're young and inexperienced you will be at risk of being ripped off massively by anybody you call out.

Are your parents not contactable? Do you have any family locally you can ring and ask (uncle, granddad etc)?

psychic_teabag

We had something similar not that long ago. There has always been a long crack along the ceiling - boards separating while settling, or something like that. During a particularly windy and rainy night we had some water dripping through. Called out a roofing guy and he could see no obvious problems, and reckoned the wind had managed to push a little bit of rain through a ventilation gap or under a tile or something.

Don't think it has ever happened again.

no1catman

It may not be the roof - that is how do you know it is due to the rain?
Do you have a cold water header tank in the loft?
If so, is the overflow pipe off the tank secured to flow outside?
It may be that the float valve washer has in the process of failing - the tank fills up and overflows.
Worth checking.