I got up on the boom lift today to check out the situation and see what kind of things I’d need. I was thinking that perhaps the gutter was just old and needed some TLC. Well, boy was I wrong. This thing does not even qualify as a Yankee gutter. Apparently the previous owner had a weird concept of how to fix a built in gutter and he just used a really wide strip of aluminum flashing along the gutters length down the whole side of the house. Perhaps it was smooth when it was put in, but it’s just terrible now.
I can’t believe someone would do such a poor fix. I’m a bit more upset that my inspector didn’t mention the gutter was a pile of.. yeah.
It looks like I’m going to definetly have to rip off the fascia, rip off the sofits and rip off the ledgerboard that sits right below the gutter, it’s all rotted or leaking. I may be able to put some kind of drip edge of cap strip over the top cap of the wall framing, but whatever happens I want to make sure I can keep water out of the house, and in a way that will last for a long time to come. I’m having serious doubts as to if I’ll be able to get this done this weekend, and I only have the lift for that long.
I’m thinking that instead of trying to keep the traditional yankee gutter, I may just try to build a large commercial gutter inside of the box, but that raises issues about making sure that the water makes it only into the gutter, and not the house, and that if it were to overflow, it wouldn’t backflow into the box, which means a really good seal between a new drip edge, and the gutter.
I’ll have to figure something out, water inside the house doesn’t work and it’s not going to just quit raining for the forseeable future. I have a friend comming over to take a look at it with me. He’s very good with working with materials and knowing what is compatible and that sort of thing so maybe he will have some good ideas for me, because I’m out of them.
Here are some photos of the previous owner’s ‘fix’. The concrete block is a nice touch…. Just had ANOTHER downpour and collected about 4-5 gallons of water out of the weep holes I put in the ceiling the bedroom… gotta get this fixed!
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