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eventfarm_gw

Help with gutters/downpouts...

eventfarm
16 years ago

I have gutter downspouts on the front of my house that I find really unsightly. obviously, the entryway needs the gutters and the other lines don't (falls right into my garden), but is there a way to not make the downspouts so obvious?

A few notes - I'd love to get rid of the downspout on the left (Is that possible?). I have a rain barrel that I'm placing the the right of the entryway and I'd like to have all of the water go into that. I'm thinking that I can route that downspout down the wall on the inside of the entry and then go across further down the wall. But I clearly have no idea what I'm doing.... :)

Comments (10)

  • homebound
    16 years ago

    I would not get rid of the left gutter - you need it to handle the volume.

    But you could move the down spouts over a foot or so to run them down the side walls. Might need to mvoe the gutter holes, but maybe not.

  • Brewbeer
    16 years ago

    I agree with homebound. There is a lot of roof up there and you probably need both.

    Moving the downspouts over to the side walls will make them less noticable from the street, but they will be more noticable to anyone standing in the entry space.

  • rogerv_gw
    16 years ago

    You might try painting them to color match the side of the house, then they wouldn't stand out nearly as much. At least it would be worth a try, cheap and easy.

    -Roger

  • eventfarm
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    I don't mind if they are more visable in the entry - we don't hang out there anyway. :)

    But if I keep the left one, I need to figure out something to do with the end of the downspout. You have to look closely, but you can see that it simply pours out into my walkway.

    Any thoughts of what could be done with that?

  • Brewbeer
    16 years ago

    You could pipe it under the walkway, and daylight the pipe in the bushes.

    Or run it around the corner down low, like it is now.

  • rogerv_gw
    16 years ago

    Running the downspout under the walkway sounds good if you can manage it. However, I wouldn't have it just dump water into that garden area. You can bury plastic flexible irrigation pipe that will move the water away from your foundation to a more suitable drainage area, like the street. Around here, they cut a hole in the curb, and run downspout drainage out to the street using drainage pipe that goes the hole in the curb.

    If you can't get the downspout under your walkway due to having too much paving right in that area, you could just extend the downspout along where it is now over to the garden area where you can then run the drainage out to the curb underground.

    I would be thinking about running the water from the downspout on the other side underground as well, rather than dumping it right by your foundation. You should have a drainage gravel patch under that downspout at a minimum.

    -Roger

  • sombreuil_mongrel
    16 years ago

    You could have the leaders put into the back corners (as opposed to their front location at present), turn the ells so they ran down the inside corners of the brick into pipes that ran underground to daylight, and paint the downspouts a color to match the brick. That setup would make them less visible from the street.
    A less-costly alternative would be to change the elbows so they ran down the very corners of the brick walls. If they were painted they would be less obvious, look more like "trim".
    whoever mounted them at different spacings either didn't know what to do, or was trying to miss a planting or connect to poorly-placed in ground piping.
    Casey

  • edsacre
    16 years ago

    Another vote to get the downspouts to the corner of the walls perpendicular to the entry doors.
    Piping the left side downspout under the walk to a drywell or outlet whould be nice.

  • eventfarm
    Original Author
    16 years ago

    wow! thanks for all the replies. The corners sound like a great idea. The reason the right one is further over is that there is actually a wall there, they probably wanted to get to the other side of the wall. I'm planning on putting a small fountain inside that wall. But I could actually put my rain barrel on the inside of the wall, the downspout coming down the corner into it, then use the fountain to hide the rain barrel. I'll have to see if there's enough room for that. I could route that overflow into the garden to the right.

    The left down spout can go to the garden on the left, I never really even thought about that. This place had some serious drainage problems when I first moved in. In the first big storm, one whole side of the house was flooded. So I built this:

    There is a french drain under all that rock. It was a fun (laborous) project. I could route the left downspout into an underground pipe that goes to the french drain....

    Speaking of downspouts. Don't you love how the one in that pic terminates right inside the garden edging. I never noticed that - guess I need to fix that too, huh?

  • rogerv_gw
    16 years ago

    Using your French drain for the downspouts sounds like a great idea, as long as it will handle the capacity.

    -Roger

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