New Gutters On House

[lowell holmes]

We are having them installed today.
The contractor showed up with a truck that has a gutter machine in it. They can extrude complete lengths of gutter as needed. I am impressed.

[Charlie Velasquez]

I hated cleaning gutters. 10 years ago I installed a French drain system. No gutters for long time, it was great.
When we were getting ready to sell our house, the realtor said regardless of the efficiency of the system, no one in Iowa would want a house without gutters. $2,000 later we had gutters.

[lowell holmes]

They are installed and the truck is gone.

[Mel Fulks]

Charlie, you were lucky the realtor knew someone in the biz !!!

[Frank Pratt]

It's cool to watch a 40' long gutter come out of a truck that's only 18' long. They've been doing gutters that way for probably 40 or 50 years around here.

[Jim Becker]

On-site extruded seamless gutters are the best way to do it!

Charlie, it would be nice to be able to do diffusers and a French drain, but many of us have properties that are not suitable for that, unfortunately.

[Tom M King]

There's always another level of "best". These don't come in lengths longer than 26' (if I'm remembering correctly), but they come shipped in boxes that you can walk on, with each piece separated by a foamy paper. You have to pay for the boxes though, in addition to the gutters.

https://classicgutters.com/product-category/6-half-round-gutter/

One of the things I like about them is that they are completely unobstructed, along the top.

Today, we went to check on a house that I put these on several years ago. It has the 6" half rounds, with 4" round downspouts. Out the end of each downspout was a big extruded line of leaves. They're really easy to clean out with an elbow on the pressure washer, but there is never much in them to blast out.

[Dave Anderson NH]

No gutters here. I specifically asked the contractor not to install them when he built the house. We are surrounded on 3 sides by trees, many close to the house. I have good French drains around the perimeter and have had no problems with water in the basement. We are also the second house from the top of the hill and the landscaping slopes away from the house on all sides. Gutters would need to be cleaned at least 3 times each fall on a 2 story house.

[Mel Fulks]

Copper is good!! But I think those half round things look best up high ! Where money is not a problem , there are options. One house we worked on had a room designed to look added on. Stainless steel " Terne coated " roof so it could be
painted. Rest of the place had slate . All gutters on house were built in. House had 3 heating systems!

[Tom M King]

I have the cheap gutters on our house, but I don't have downspouts. I like a big overhang, so they're well away from the house. The downstream end is wide open, and down below, on the ground is a large Granite rock with the top sloping away from the house. We have large overhanging trees, but there is never any gutter cleaning needed. They're self cleaning. The stones were free because we have an almost unlimited supply around the abandoned rock quarry on our place. The size was only limited by what my loader could pick up.

I think it was 2012 when the company making Terne coated went out of business. Is it available any more? I think roll formed panels put that under.

I almost put Terne coated stainless on a house I was building in 1991, but then I checked the price of copper, and it was 90 cents a pound. Break even cost would be the second time the roof needed to be painted, so I went with copper. The last time I checked, several years ago, rolls of copper were 10 bucks a pound.

We have some friends with a house with unpainted TCS, but it is showing some signs of rust. I'm not sure how old it is, and it's been several years since I've seen it, so don't know what they ended up doing.

[Lisa Starr]

We have half round Zinc Gutters on our home. They came from World Gutter Systems right here in Erie, PA. Because we are local, they custom made ours to cover half the length we require. Brazed 1 seam on site, and it is covered by the hanger, so doesn't show. We love the look and get tons of comments. They weren't cheap though!

[Mark Daily]

Not much need for gutters here in Phoenix.:(

[mike stenson]

Not much need for gutters here in Phoenix.:(

Actually, I really need some on my shop building in Tucson ;) but we do get more rain than you for sure.

[Mel Fulks]

Tom ,that was 17 years ago, and was my only experience with it.

[Warren Lake]

Did my own and it worked out well, front one 60 feet one piece, had the guy that ran it help me lift it onto brackets that I made then I tied it on so the wind could not catch it till I had it all fastened and mitres cut., Five down spouts and did them neater than the contractor that did that for a living and did one other place for me. I was slow as a slug but I never see that when I look at it. Just its neat and works perfedtly. all the shorter lengths were put in through a window and stored inside in a 35 foot room on a diagonal untill I put them up, that kept them safe. As long as it is not windy you can handle a pretty long chunk of eves trough. My second longest was 35 feet plus a bit for the end cuts and pretty sure I put that one up myself but it was a bit of a really pay attention type thing and zero wind. One of the best things I did was I found one Wiss cutter I had was defective. I quit with Wiss and got all new Midwest stuff and have more than I need. bit of an adventure always figuring out which one or ones you can use as you work through the mitres as the offcuts never fails are in the way. Happy with the midwest stuff, good quality.

[Tom M King]

Wiss's are adjustable, but I got tired of fooling with them, and tried some Milwaukee snips. Now, my roofing, and sheetmetal toolboxes have only Milwaukee snips in them, for the regular sized ones. But you're right, whichever one I pick up first is not the one I need.

[Bruce Wrenn]

In this market, "Leaf Guard" is the top brand of gutters. They are a one piece, formed on site gutter. One customer had them on an addition that was located under pine trees. Carpenter bees got into facia board, requiring replacement. When I took gutters down, only thing in them was some roof granuales, no pine needles.

[Jerome Stanek]

In this market, "Leaf Guard" is the top brand of gutters. They are a one piece, formed on site gutter. One customer had them on an addition that was located under pine trees. Carpenter bees got into facia board, requiring replacement. When I took gutters down, only thing in them was some roof granuales, no pine needles.

For what they cost you could have regular gutters cleaned for over 10 years

[Brian Elfert]

I have Leafguard on the back of my house. Expensive, but I don't have to deal with cleaning gutters or finding someone to clean them. The gutter is a single 53 foot piece that cost $1,700 installed. I declined to do the front after choking on the cost for the back.

This was in 2016. Leafguard at least doubled in price from when I had them put on my previous house in 2002. There was inflation since 2002, but inflation was only 40%, not 100%.

[Mel Fulks]

Golly, I've heard Leafgaurd is good ,but I could never have guessed they are so expensive. I bought the regular made on site stuff and put the spongy insert in them . Bought those at Costco and they work well. I think more than one company
sells them. The sponge kinda' works like the Leafguard top covers. I think they have been up 3or 4 years.

[Brian Elfert]

The Leafguard cost $32 per foot. I put a regular gutter on my detached garage for $10 per foot. (Garage doesn't have trees near it.) $10 per foot was expensive for plain seamless gutters, but the job was fairly small.

The local Leafguard installer often has 50% off labor or even free labor. The gimmick is that they charge very little for labor and a LOT for materials. The savings, even with free labor, is minimal.