At Home In The Woods

[dstig1]

You could give them some buffer space and make a cage around them with chicken wire, perhaps, so it doesn't plug up with a couple leaves. Might look redneck though.

You could bury them under rip rap, but then clean out would require moving rocks all the time.

You could just screen the ends and check and clean often.

Dig a dry well and put rocks in it, make a shroud over it with chicken wire so the water drains into the rocks and you only need to pull the cage to clean out.

Set a basket into the ground, like a sprinkler valve tub, dig drywell with rocks below it, let drain into the basket through cutouts in the side. Then pop the basket lid to get access for clean out.

Mostly I think you just need some buffer space so it doesn't plug too fast, but maintenance will be required in any case.

BTW - on the other end of this -
If you are going to go to the trouble to do this, on the upstream end, I'd put cleanouts in them right now. Why not save the hassle while you are doing it now?

 

[tony Cecil]

Hi Obed

In my case, I just left the ends alone and in twenty five years even with black ridged pipe have not had any problem, except where a large dump container gouged the end up when they were dropping it off the truck...No animals etc...I also, three years ago ,installed a leaf guard system on the back side of the house, and so far haven`t had any trouble with it...I don`t know why so many people complain about them...What leaves do accumulate on the exterior--in the fall-- blow away after they dry out.....Tony

 

[eepete]

I have 4" smooth PVC burried gutter drain pipes. I leave the ends open. When you get a birds nest in there, it will flush down and be able to flush out of the pipe. Use the widest sweeps you can.

There is enough of a gap where the gutter drain comes into the pipes that I could get a electrical fish tape in there if it clogged. So far, anything that makes it down to the bottom of the gutter drain flushes through.

Here is a picture of how the transition occurs. The wire is a ground on the drain, and I have a strap connecting the gutter to the metal roof on the house for lightning protection.

I tried gutter guards on our old house. Between some pine trees and other tree debris, the gutter slowly fills and every other year I have to take the guards off and clean them. I think success with gutter guards is a YMMV situation. I have no gutter guards on the new house, but went with 6" wide gutters. The goal is to have them self-clean. But the new house is out in a field so there are very few tree leaves that ever make it in. Far more problems with bird nests than leaves.

Anyway, I'd leave the far ends of the gutter drains open, put some rock down to avoid erosion and see what happens. I think the only critters that could get in the pipe and get on the roof could do so on the outside of the pipes. Indeed, at the old house I've found snake skins in the gutters.

Pete

 

[srs]

A friend of mine has this "wye" pipe connected to the downspout at ground level. He added a plastic cap on the end and it fits loosely so if he ever has to clean the underground pipe he just pulls off the cap. I think it's a good way to keep you from having to get on a ladder. Also I would leave the pipe open at the ends. One time at my house a bird fell into the gutter, I heard him making a racket, but eventually he just walked out to the bottom. Would have been funny except it was about 5 AM and scared the crap out of us!

http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/images/products/pipe/400/31012p.jpg

 

[Obed]

A friend of mine has this "wye" pipe connected to the downspout at ground level. He added a plastic cap on the end and it fits loosely so if he ever has to clean the underground pipe he just pulls off the cap. I think it's a good way to keep you from having to get on a ladder. http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/images/products/pipe/400/31012p.jpg

Stanley,
I hadn't thought about using a 45 degree wye but that would probably work well. We have one more second storie gutter that needs the drains installed. I believe I will put a cleanout at the bottom of that downspout. I might consider cleanouts for all the rest of them. We'll have to see. Thanks for the suggestions.

Obed

 

[srs]

You are so welcome! Hopefully you won't need to use the clean-outs though.

 

[Obed]

Gutter Cleaning Part 2
Today we cleaned out the last gutter, the one on the 2 story part of the roof. I left this gutter for another day last week when I cleaned out the gutters that were just 1 story or 1 1/2 stories above the ground. At first I extended my extension ladder as high as it would go. I could just reach into the gutter and clean it out. However, my reach was very limited because our eaves are 2 feet deep. Few houses these days have 2 foot deep eaves but we wanted them for the many practical advantages to a deeper eave.

At first I really didn't like being up that high on the ladder. After the first little bit, I got used to it. I did make sure that my ladder was on a good level spot before climbing it.

My wife wanted to try putting on her rock climbing harness and getting on the roof and trying to clean it out while I belayed her with a rope. We've done some rock climbing so we have some experience with harnesses and ropes. When my wife got down to the edge of the 8/12 pitch roof, she realized she could not reach into the gutter in her squatting position. Lying on her stomach was not an option as she would just roll of the roof. She ended up using a broom handle to rake the gutter debris into piles. I then moved my ladder to each pile and removed the debris while standing on the ladder.

I believe that I'll invest in a taller and stronger ladder. My ladder is a 24' extension ladder that is 21' fully extended. The manufacturer euphamistically calls it a 24' ladder because each section is 12' long. The eave of our house is 22' above the ground so a 21' extended ladder doesn't cut it. It seems that all the gutter cleaning gadgets I read about and heard about don't really keep you off a ladder if you need to clean a gutter as tall as ours.

 

[Obed]

My wife installed an aluminum angle bracket support for the kitchen bar top. The countertop installers did not install a support at the end of the counter. I'm not sure why. I'm not sure if it was an oversight or if something was preventing them from doing it at the time. My wife may have told them not to install a support there because she wanted to have it done the way she would like it.

My wife didn't like how it would look by just installing an aluminum angle bracket so she fashioned a piece of moulding to go cover the angle bracket. I personally would have lived with the angle bracket but I'm not particularly attuned to aesthetics.

 

[Obed]

You could give them some buffer space and make a cage around them with chicken wire, perhaps, so it doesn't plug up with a couple leaves. Might look redneck though.

You could bury them under rip rap, but then clean out would require moving rocks all the time.

You could just screen the ends and check and clean often.

Dig a dry well and put rocks in it, make a shroud over it with chicken wire so the water drains into the rocks and you only need to pull the cage to clean out.

Set a basket into the ground, like a sprinkler valve tub, dig drywell with rocks below it, let drain into the basket through cutouts in the side. Then pop the basket lid to get access for clean out.

Mostly I think you just need some buffer space so it doesn't plug too fast, but maintenance will be required in any case.

BTW - on the other end of this -
If you are going to go to the trouble to do this, on the upstream end, I'd put cleanouts in them right now. Why not save the hassle while you are doing it now?

Dave,
Those are some good suggestions. I think I'll just leave the ends of the gutter drain pipes wide open. However, I believe I'll put grates on the ends of the two pipes that connect to the foundation drain tiles. Those pipes shouldn't have tons of water flowing out of them like, unlike the gutter drains. Thus, the drain tile pipes won't self clean out if critters build nests in them. However, unlike the gutter drains, the drain tile drains will not have a lot of leaves and hopefully very little other debris so I think that putting grates on the ends of them will be ok.

Obed

 

[Barton]

Obed, I think if you used a ladder stabilizer you may not have to buy a taller ladder. I use a simple one and it does make the ladder much more stable. The down side is that you have more weight on the top end. It will also keep your ladder of the gutters on your shorter walls. Look at the Louisville Adjustable Ladder Stand-off. I got my simple one at Lowes.

Bart