How to Flash a Window | This Old House

well I'm actually going to show you how to properly flash the top of a window okay you can have the best window the most efficient window it can be installed Blum and Square and everything else but if it's not flashed right water will get into the building okay so teach me how to properly flash the top of window all right is different types of material this is a piece of aluminum right here and it's called a Zee flashing comes in different widths to match the trim of your window and this is stock and it's already bent up you can find it easily at the hardware store right now this piece would actually sit on top of the window gotcha now this piece of Zee flashing right here is actually to narrow across the front see there's a space right here so I'd have to fabricate a piece on make my own because of the build up of this window not uncommon with these old windows exactly now the first thing I want to take the measurement of is this leading edge way the flashing comes down over the front alright and that's about a quarter of an inch so I mark a quarter of an inch on my flashing like that I then take the piece over to my brake line up my pencil lines bringing it down so we've seen you use a brake before for bending sheet metal for gutters and such right okay now it's clamped down tight I simply bring it up and bend it a little bit past 90 mm-hmm I now have my leading edge okay now I want to bend the flashing up the wall I've created a gauge block the thickness of the casing plus the molding I take the gauge block and I push it against my brake and I hold my flashing flush with the gauge block now I don't have a break can I borrow yours mm well I know you can rent them alright now I just bend that up a little bit past 90 and now I've created my own Zee flashing all right now let's see how we did put this on here it fits tight to the wall no space behind it and we've made up our own Zee flash now let me show you how you can bend this flash and without a break alright now again the first thing I want is this leading edge right here which is a quarter of an inch I'm gonna take my framing square and I'm gonna put it over the flashing revealing about a quarter of an inch with my utility knife I'm lightly gonna score right across I've got two pieces of 2x8 clamped together and what do you got a bevel on the end right I've got each piece beveled about eight to ten degrees because when I bend the metal it'll spring back so I have to go past 90 to make a 90 all right so we've got ourselves a little homemade break right so now I'm going to put the piece in and I'm gonna line up with my slice okay I got it lined up now let's just clamp down on these clamps cuz I don't want that piece to move okay now I'm gonna take a scrap piece of wood I'm gonna put it right on top of the piece now hold up hold our peace I'm gonna push down okay now it's they're gonna take my hammer just tap it alright let's see how we did okay now you might have to pry that open with a hammer a little bit okay now you can actually see our leading edge is bent now we have to bend the other piece up in the back so that we'll use our gauge block okay so again that is the thickness of the window casing in the trim right so I'll put it on there and a hold it flush on the outside I'm gonna put a little mark on this side now on the other side all right let's lock it down tight you know this one I have to bend forward to me so I'm going to put the two body in here okay now I'm going to pull the piece over you know take the hammer and bang it down alright that's how you did pretty good alright now we take it out now we have a Z flashing you

Channel: This Old House

Views: 456,581

Rating: 4.5646439 out of 5

Keywords: This Old House, Ask This Old House, DIY, Home Improvement, DIY Ideas, Renovation, Renovation Ideas, How To Fix, How To Install, How To Build, window flashing, Window, Do It Yourself, aluminum, custom flashing, Home Repair, Tom Silva, fabricate, tom silva this old house, tom silva house, tom silva construction, tom silva tools, tommy silva, home renovation ideas on a budget

Id: DGmLFvZ7Jg0

Length: 3min 52sec (232 seconds)

Published: Thu Oct 30 2014