Browse Forums General Discussion 1 Feb 02, 2013 7:57 am Our gutters are very difficult to safely access/clean and so we were thinking of installing a guard for our gutters. Does anyone have experience with guards in the Sydney area? I do not want to have to risk getting up to clear the gutters – is this possible or does the sediment still need to be manually removed from time to time? How is this issue solves with hard to access gutters? Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 2Feb 02, 2013 1:12 pm Are your gutters in good condition or will they need replacing any time soon? 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 4Feb 03, 2013 11:15 am I recently had a long facia board replaced and I had a carpenter do it. If there is wood rot present, it needs to be replaced. It didn't cost that much to have it done but I forget the amount. No doubt that it would have cost a lot more if a plumber had done it. The only gutter guard protection system that I recommend is the surface tension Leaf Safe system. It is metal and as the water is directed in from the front side, the gutter is constantly flushed from front to back. The problem with normal leaf guard is that the flow pattern during heavier rain is interrupted and the gutter no longer gets the same flushing action from front to rear. This promotes a build up of sediment and there are also additional access issues that people complain about. The Leaf Safe has removable sections for access but this is not an issue in any case. The gutters do need to be lowered however and so fitting it is more cost effective if the gutters also need replacing. http://www.leafsafeguttering.com.au/ All other gutter guard is not maintenance free and maintenance is made much more difficult. A lot of people are now removing theirs. Don't believe the "maintenance free" claims. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 5Feb 03, 2013 7:46 pm This looks like a very interesting system. Has anyone else installed them? How much did it cost (approx)? Any problems? I just wonder how they work when the rain really buckets down (i.e. if there is a large volume of fast flowing water whether it wouldn't just go straight over the side and not get directed into the holes). Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 6Feb 04, 2013 12:28 am You would have to Email them for prices and the suitability (width) for you gutters. One problem is with having to lower the existing guttering as this is an extra labour cost. Another problem is when there is a lot of honey and sap that disrupts the surface ahhesion. Probably the biggest problem is finding a good plumber. They need to remember to remove the plastic when they install it, not all of them think to do it. I was told that one plumber even installed it upside down! The same inventor invented the bull nose type that was around a few years ago. I think that Boral took it on. That version had some trouble with pine needles rolling under the bull nose. The bull nose design is still dominant in the U.S. The current one has been around for a while now and doesn't have that problem plus it also lets in sunlight that prevents the formation of black mould, something that some sealed systems are prone to. Re flow - surface adhesion works best when there is a good flow of water. If you turn a tap on and place a backwards facing spoon into the flow, the water will adhere to the curved surface and flow off at an angle. There are some U.S. websites that have videos of massive amounts of water being collected. The Leaf Safe holes actually have upper flaps that fold inwards and the water adheres to them. Is there were just holes, it would not work. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 7Feb 04, 2013 12:46 am Just found this odd U.S. bull nose version that has a video showing fire trucks pouring water onto a house roof. The claimed amount of water was double the highest hourly rate of rainfall ever recorded in the U.S. (according to the voice over man)! Why didn't the gutters overflow? http://www.nevercleanyourgutters.com/ht ... works.html 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 8Feb 09, 2013 1:24 pm The bull nose version appears to be much better than the Australian one (it appears that you don't have to remove your gutters, the gutters don't have to hang lower etc). Do you know whether this (or a similar) product is available in Australia? Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 9Feb 09, 2013 2:29 pm The bull nose stopped being sold quite some time ago. The Australian Leaf Safe is technically better and much better suited to rainwater harvesting. If I was building in a bushfire prone area or collecting rainwater, it's what I would be using. Given the evidence of house fires as a result of ember attack, it is an issue that I am surprised the insurance companies haven't investigated. Easier to just put everyone's premium up I guess. The same goes for shires that have previously been devastated by bush fires. How many of those shires have since introduced building regulations to reduce the fire risks associated with ember attack? 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 10Feb 14, 2013 9:16 pm It appears that it is still being sold: http://www.aci-hq.com.au/gutteringsystem.html Why did it fall out of favour? The main issue with the http://www.leafsafeguttering.com.au/ system appears to be that it makes the gutting look very bulky (relative to how houses typically look) due to the lowering of the guttering. Re: Gutter guards in Sydney 11Feb 15, 2013 12:06 am I wasn't aware that this was on the market. The diagram shows that it is a gutter and surface adhesion bull nose system all in one, notice how low the gutter actually is. Very much like some of the U.S. ones but it also means that you would have to replace the guttering. Would be interesting to get some prices. I also notice that they are in NSW. Maybe you could contact them and ask for some addresses where they have been installed. I was at the Leaf Safe inventor's house in S.A. last October. Maybe it's the way that my eye was drawn to the slots but it didn't appear bulky and looked stylish. The house is in the Adelaide Hills surrounded by tall trees and the roof had a lot of leaves and sticks all over it. He (Richard) said that all he does occasionally is quickly run a soft broom along the outside to clear any small flowers from the trees. I wish that I had taken a photo of the roof. The tank water was pristine! One advantage of normal gutter mesh is that you don't have to fit it to the entire house. With a surface adhesion system, it's either the lot or nothing due to the different gutter levels. Have you looked at the Fielders Watergate zinc gutter mesh? It clips under the roll, comes in packs of 8 x 1.25 metre lengths and costs $40 a pack in the Bunnings garden section. It is fairly easy to fit and you should be able to find someone willing to do it. It is best to leave some gaps or make provision fot the easy removal of different sections for maintenance access. It is good value but like other gutter mesh, it disrupts the flushing from the front of the gutter to the back during heavier rain. This is what causes sediment build up in a lot of gutters fitted with mesh barriers. The double whammy with gutter mesh is that it also restricts access. 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. No, I even have sections of narrowness where the tiles won't slide up any further. 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