Replacing roof fascia

[On net]

Our fascia (on a two storey semi) is in a pretty dreadful state and needs replacement. We have metal guttering that is screwed directly into the fascia, and besides all the flaking paint, the guttering screws are starting to escape from the fascia, allowing the gutter to drop a little in one place.

The soffits seem to be intact and I'm not sure what they're made of. I had a devil of a time drilling through one to run a cable into the loft.

I'm tempted to buy a cheap scaffolding tower to do this job and just replace the woodwork, though maybe I should be looking at plastic.

Any thoughts?

[Simon]

On my extension, I'm fitting pressure-treated wooden fascia (6" barge boards), and capping with ogee-style PVCu. I much prefer working in wood for the structure. If you use PVCu, get it from an online plastics manufacturer - far far cheaper than from anywhere else. You can get thicker 18mm etc. plastic boards to use instead of wood, but they are all supposed to be fixed to the rafter ends just with the "poly pins" (plastic topped nails), which depending on the condition of the rafter ends may not offer a secure enough fixing. Or use plastic-capped screws which look awful. You are also supposed to screw the gutter supports into this plastic. Note though, its not advisable to just cap rotten wooden boards, and this is a trick dodgy fascia fitting companies use.

Personally I've do the job from the top of ladders - I just changed the cast iron gutters for plastic that way, but a scaffold tower is obviously safer. You can buy and sell on ebay after if you only need it once.

Good luck, Simon.

[On net]

Just inspecting the gutters and fascia on a ladder was scary enough for me!

Just to make life a bit more complicated our windows are almost up to the gutter level, so accessing that particular area without the ladder leaning on the gutter, is tricky in itself.

I will need it!

Thanks Simon.

Paul