Milford on Sea gutter cleaning, salt and all
This close to the water the fixings go before the gutter does. We clear the run, flush every downpipe, and tell you what the brackets look like.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Clear the seaward gutters more often than the sheltered ones. On a house this close to the water the south and west runs fill first and their brackets and fixings corrode first, and the two problems turn up in the same visit.
People ring here for one of three reasons. Water is sheeting over the front edge in a downpour and running down the wall. A dark stripe has appeared under one joint and will not dry out between showers. Or nothing looks wrong at all and the gutters have simply not been touched since the house was bought.
We work the whole rainwater system rather than the length that looks worst from the pavement. Every run cleared by hand into a bag, the outlets picked out, each downpipe flushed from the top until it runs clean at the shoe, and any hopper or valley gutter checked on the way past. Then we walk you round the outside and tell you what we found. The site visit and the written itemised quote are free, and if what you have is a split joint rather than a blockage we will say so.
The work
Clearing a run that faces the water
Four things happen on a normal visit here, and only the first is cleaning.
Getting the run empty. What comes out of a gutter in Milford on Sea is rarely just leaves. There is leaf litter off the garden, moss washed down from the tiles a handful at a time, and a fine grey silt that is part roof grit and part salt dust. Leaf litter is a scoop job. Moss sets into a wet mat that has to be dug out and bagged, and the silt behind it is heavier and slower than any photograph makes it look. We clear by hand where we can stand safely, and by vacuum on a pole where the run sits over a conservatory.
Proving the outlets and the downpipes. The gutter is not usually the part that blocks. The outlet is, and so is the swan neck at the top of the downpipe and the shoe at the bottom. Silt packs at every change of direction and sets hard once it dries. Each outlet is cleared by hand, then water is run through the whole length and down every pipe until it comes out clean. That is the part most often skipped. Where a pipe is boxed in or feeds a hopper, a camera settles it in a minute.
What the salt has done to the fixings. Brackets, screws, union clips and the nails through a fascia corrode from the exposed edge inwards, and a run half full of wet debris hangs on those fixings all winter. Every bracket gets a push while we are up there, and anything soft, sprung or missing is flagged with a photograph. On the older houses the rainwater goods are cast iron and the rust starts on the back face where nobody looks.
Sagging, drips and the small repairs. A run that has lost its fall holds water in the middle and drips over the front edge long after the rain has stopped. That is a re-hang, not a clear: the brackets come off, the line is reset to a fall towards the outlet and the run is refixed. A joint that weeps once water is moving wants a new union seal, not sealant smeared over the outside. A bowed length gets extra support or is replaced.
What is underneath. Water over the front edge lands on the fascia, then the soffit, then the render or brickwork below, and that is where it shows: green staining, damp in a bedroom corner, soft timber behind the gutter.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting your work out to somebody you have never met. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: access, the length of run, the number of outlets and downpipes, any repair, and where the debris goes on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.
Clearing a gutter needs nobody's permission and there is nothing for building control to sign off, though altering or adding rainwater drainage does sit under Approved Document H. Milford on Sea has no conservation area of its own. There are listed buildings scattered through the village, and on those alone swapping cast iron for plastic counts as a change of appearance and needs consent. New Forest District Council is the authority.
Cost
What decides the price of a gutter clean
No rate per square metre, because a metre of gutter behind a conifer and a metre on an open gable are not the same metre.
Getting to it. A seafront bungalow with one long open run, a chalet house with a dormer sitting over the gutter, and a block of flats with the hopper on a back elevation are three different mornings before anybody opens a ladder. A bungalow run comes off a ladder or a pole, a three storey gable wants a tower, and a valley gutter between two roofs wants a proper platform. The work at height rules are why the access is a priced line rather than something absorbed into a rate.
What is in it, and how far it has travelled. Leaf litter lifts out in minutes. Moss washed off the tiles sets into a wet mat that has to be dug out, and silt in a long run behind a hedge is heavier and slower than anything a photograph shows. The number of outlets matters more than the length, because that is where it packs.
Whether it is a clean or a repair. A joint that drips once it is running again, a downpipe blocked at the shoe, a length of plastic that has sagged between brackets: none of that is clearing, and it is the part that decides whether you are booking an hour or half a day.
Comparing quotes? Ask whether the downpipes are being run through or just the gutter cleared, whether the outlets and hoppers are checked, whether it is a clear or a clear and a check for leaks, and who takes the debris away. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If it is overflowing now
Water coming over the gutter in heavy rain
Ring rather than use the form. Water running down a wall in a downpour soaks the brickwork and finds its way to a ceiling faster than most people expect, so a blocked outlet in a wet week goes to the front of the queue. We clear it, run water through to prove it, and tell you honestly if what you actually have is a broken joint rather than a blockage. Say if it is the seaward elevation, because that is the wall that stays wet longest here and it moves you up the list. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
The seaward side earns a shorter interval
Milford on Sea sits well under a mile from the water, and salt changes the maintenance interval on a gutter more than anything else about the house does. Salt on metal holds moisture out of the air between showers, so a bracket or a cast iron socket here spends far more of the year damp than the same fitting three miles inland, and it corrodes from the exposed edge inwards. The honest advice on this coast is not just to clear more often, but to look at what is holding the run up while somebody is there.
In practice it splits the house in two. The south and west elevations take the weather and the salt, and they are worth doing every autumn without fail. The sheltered side will often go two years without complaint. So do the whole system once, get a written note of which runs and fixings are the tired ones, and keep the exposed side on a shorter interval after that. That is a better use of money than doing everything twice.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover Milford on Sea, Everton, Hordle, Keyhaven and along to Lymington, broadly SO41, under New Forest District Council. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.
Questions
Milford on Sea questions we get asked
How often should gutters be cleared this close to the sea?
Once a year for the whole house, and the seaward elevation again if anything overhangs it. Salt keeps the fixings damp and exposure fills the windward runs faster. Autumn, once the leaves are down, does the most good.
Can you do it from the ground rather than off a ladder?
A lot of it, yes. A vacuum on a reach pole handles a bungalow or an ordinary two storey run and keeps everybody off the roof line, which is what when a ladder is the right tool tells you to do. It cannot test a bracket or prove a downpipe, so those get done properly.
The gutters were cleared last year. Why is it still overflowing?
Usually because the blockage is not in the gutter. Silt packs at the outlet and in the swan neck and sets hard, so clearing the run without flushing the pipes leaves it there. The other answer is a run that has dropped off its fall and is holding water rather than blocked at all.
Do you repair gutters as well, or only clear them?
Both, priced separately. Brackets, union seals, a downpipe shoe, re-hanging a run and replacing a bowed length are ordinary work. If a system is at the end of its life we will say so rather than clear it every autumn.
Where does everything you pull out of the gutter end up?
In bags, in the van, and away with us. Nothing is tipped into a border or washed down a gully, and the ground under the run is sheeted first.
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Get the whole rainwater system looked at
Thomas comes out, clears and proves every run, photographs anything tired and sends a written itemised quote with the repairs on their own lines. Free.