The Roof Cleaning Institute Of America Training & Certification Forum
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Hey Everyone,

I’m new to the forum and wanted to ask a few questions that have probably been asked before but after reading hundreds of posts on both the members and public areas I still have not truly found an answer I’m comfortable with (plus my eyes are hurting from so much reading).

 I also want to say thank you to everyone who has contributed to make this happen, I truly think this is a great site and I have learned a great amount about this industry. Please keep up the great work!

Now to my questions and concerns (by the way, for good or for bad I over think and worry way too much, so I think I maybe watering and rinsing a bit extensively, but it can’t hurt right :o) )

Background: Working in the Northeast U.S., 90% of all houses have gutters, 60% have gutter guards/covers, 60% have underground drainage systems to a dry well or release to the yard away from the house.

Questions:

1)      I’ve seen three different methodologies for dealing with gutters and runoff and I want to see which is preferred and if I was understanding the presented material correctly.

a.       Block gutter down spouts, fill with water to dilute chemical and let gutters continually over flow, then release the water and soak the ground some more. I see some issues with this due to weight concerns, but not a bad concept but many houses we service have old gutters.

b.       Bag gutter down spouts to collect runoff, bucket collected chem, and take away when leaving.  Then flush gutters well (or not, this seems to be a gray area for me based on the posts). Again soaking the down spout areas well before introduction of any chemical. Only concern is volume of chemical discharge when flushing.

c.       Soak the area at the downspout, and then flush the gutters, then re water area at down deposit location.

2)      When rinsing out gutters, how much is enough water.

a.       Enough to clean out all standing chem

b.      Enough to clean out all standing chem and rinse sides of any reside.

3)      When watering at the bottom of a down spout how much water is enough? (This is my big question, I say when it seems like enough do it 2x more)

a.       One persons soaking is another’s 1 min wet down.  (Looking for time / volumes if possible)

4)      How do I handle gutter guards, most houses have either the tin type with slits cut or gutter helmet. Tin type I can remove sections to get a hose in but the gutter helmet / topper in most cases I cannot. I try shooting water in them using this gutter cleaning stick but it’s a pain in the butt and never seems to do a great job.

(As well, I install Gutterglove gutter protection and wanted to see if there were any ideas as to the reaction of with roof mix with stainless steel mesh and anodized aluminum?)

5)      1 out of 10 how important is rinsing out gutters.  Some of these houses are 3+ stories and getting up to shoot the roof is a 40’ ladder... I do my best but some areas are completely impossible to reach. (I don’t even see how they got gutters installed without a man lift)

6)      Gutter Drain systems: a good % of the time I cannot get any fluid (or minimal) to exit these systems (long runs), or they drain into a Dry Well water collection system under ground. 

a.       How do I deal with either of these situations?

b.      When they do discharge is it very hard to collect any of it. Any ideas? (Was thinking about cutting out a patch of grass digging a hole and keeping it soaked ) So far lots of water has worked.

7)      Roof rinsing – to rinse or not to rinse. I’ve seen this go either way on here and up here in the north with all the gutters I have not been rinsing anything with a gutter.  Still far so good.

8)      Last question, it seems that most of my jobs to shoot the roof takes about  ¼ of the total time on the job and “clean up” the watering / rinsing takes 3/4, does this seem about right or am I over doing it.

Thanks to all who replay and thanks again for all the knowledge.