Gutters Joined

      A few more days work and the gutters are now ready to put up onto the house.
First the end stops were put on the bottom ends of the gutters. This involved drilling holes, adding silicone and putting rivets through the holes. The kit home company have given us spiffy rivets which exactly match the colour of the gutters - Slate Grey.

     Then the end stops were put on the top ends of the gutters.

        Then we cut the gutters to length. After lots of measuring of the various bits and pieces that will go onto the side of the house at each end, taking into account the length of the fascia board, the downspouts and what-not, we came up with some measurements. Then we did it all over again to try and make sure it was right. Then I put the pieces in roughly the right spot and measured it - yep Josh's measurements were spot on. So he measured and started cutting the gutter - then I wandered along and said (just to be silly) 'Remember to always measure twice and cut once!' Then I measured it and - oh no - it was 10 cm short as the overlap of the two gutters pieces had not been taken into account. Luckily it was just a tiny millimetre cut which was easily patched with silicone. So it turns out that the old adage 'measure twice and cut once' is actually true. Anyway, then the gutters were cut to length without too many further dramas, leaving us two short offcuts.

     A test run of joining the two pieces by sliding them together proved to be impossible, even though all the gutter guides we had read simply said 'Just join the two pieces together and carry on with the rest of the job,' implying that it was simple and easy. A quick google showed that in fact there are a couple of things you do actually need to know - you have to cut a bit of the top edges of the gutter, and you have to TWIST the pieces together, instead of sliding. I wish that instructions would give a bit more detail for things like that. Anyway after knowing that it was much easier to join the pieces together.

        Now we have these annoying long gutters getting in the way. Next step is to figure out how we can put these gutters up!