Gutter repair

[Walter E.]

My house has aluminum gutters. they are attached to the fascia boards with

7" aluminum spikes and ferrules. Many of these spikes have worked loose over the last 30 years and the gutters are drooping. Home Depot sells 7" Gutter Screws that replace the aluminum spikes. For superior holding power, they are made of painted steel.

My question is, will the steel screws that go through the rim of the aluminum gutter compromise the gutters due to electrolytic interaction? Will this hold for about 5 years?

I tried out the long screws vs the long spikes and the screws are holding much better than the aluminum spikes, probably because the screw portion of the gutter screw is slightly larger than the hole made by the original spikes.

Thanks for any input.

[Micky]

Does paint and being steel really make them hold better? I think they just wanted to put all those words on the label, so they put them in one sentence.

I don't know what mine are made of, probably steel, and I know they are brown and match the brown gutters (which is why I think there is paint on them), and they've worked fine for me.

It's been far more than 5 years since the first ones went in.

But only about half of the nails have been replaced with screws, and that's only on the south side of the house. On the north side, out of the sun, I think it's all the original nails, 36 years old.

I probably bought them at HD too. I have half a box left. If I come across them I'll tell you waht it says.

Right. If they made spikes that are bigger, they would hold better too, but screws are better still.

[DerbyDad03]

Another option is to abandon the current spikes & ferrules and use brackets:

There are many types to choose from. A couple of examples are these internal ones:

and these external ones:

When I had my gutters replaced a few years ago, they got rid of the spikes (which were doing what yours are doing) and used the internal brackets.