Gutter Cleaning in Oldbury

Moss and road grit packed into a silt that holds water

The grit is what makes this local. Road grit and brake dust off the busy roads and the junction 2 approaches settle on the roof as well as on the walls, wash down into the gutter with every shower and bind the moss into a paste that holds water. A run stripped of the loose material but left with that bed in it is blocked again by midwinter. On the B68 semis there is a second issue: conservatory guttering sits low, takes the discharge of a large roof into a small channel, and overflows straight down beside the back door, which is how most people find out it existed.

• Moss off 1930s clay and concrete tiles binding with road grit into a silt bed that packs hard
• Conservatory gutters on the Brandhall and Warley semis, sitting low and blocking before the house run does
• Continuous shared runs across the Rood End and Langley terraces, where a neighbour’s blockage becomes your damp wall
• Rear extension runs on the semis, which add length the frontage gives no hint of
• A leaf load on the streets backing onto Barnford Hill Park and Langley Park, real enough but not the main problem here

The silt bed out, the conservatory run included

A pole-mounted vacuum reaches up to three storeys, so nothing rests against your guttering, fascia or render. We take out the silt bed as well as the loose material, because in this town the bed is the part that reblocks. Downpipes are then flushed to prove the whole run flows. On a semi with a conservatory we clear that gutter on the same visit, not as an extra. While the camera is up there we record cracked sections, sagging, loose brackets and any gap opening between gutter and fascia, and show you the photographs.

• Vacuumed from ground level, with nothing leaning on render, fascia or guttering
• The grit-bound silt bed lifted out, not just the loose material sitting on top of it
• Downpipes flushed and confirmed flowing, since a clear gutter feeding a blocked pipe still overflows
• The conservatory run included on the B68 semis, because it fills before anything else on the property

More detail on the equipment and the order of work: gutter cleaning across Birmingham.

Autumn, and the reblocking problem

October and November are the obvious months, though gutter work in Oldbury spreads more evenly through the year than in tree-heavy areas, because so much of what fills a gutter here is not seasonal at all. In B68 a Brandhall or Warley visit usually takes in a house run, an extension run and a conservatory gutter together. In B69 the terraced runs at Rood End and Langley are best cleared several houses in a row at once, which is the sensible way to treat a shared run. Nobody needs to be in, though access to the rear helps. Oldbury is covered on set days, so booking ahead is the way to secure one.

Run length, height and how hard the silt has packed

The figure rests on the length of the run, the height, and how much grit and silt is packed in it. A terrace with a modest frontage is quick if it was done last year, and a shared run cleared across four houses at once works far better than doing yours alone. A Brandhall semi with a rear extension and a conservatory has considerably more run than it appears to from the pavement, and the quote follows the run rather than the width of the house. Anything left five years, with grit-bound silt and rooted growth in it, takes longer than an annual clear, so a first visit is dearer than the ones after it.

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Yearly in late autumn, twice for a Brandhall conservatory run

Annually for most of the town, booked for late autumn once the leaves are genuinely down, not in September while they are still up. Conservatory gutters on the B68 semis are worth doing twice a year, since they carry a whole roof into a small channel and overflow over the back door long before the house run gives any sign. If water is already coming over the front edge, that wants the next set day, whatever the season.