Fascias, soffits, guttering and downpipes in UPVC
The fascia is the board the gutter hangs on. The soffit is the flat board underneath it. When they go soft the gutter goes with them, so they get replaced together.
What gets replaced when a roofline is done
A full job takes the old timber off and puts UPVC in its place. Fascias, soffits, guttering, downpipes, cladding, and the apex boards at the point of a gable. The old gutter comes off with the fascia, because a new gutter on a soft board is a wasted job.
With all of it off, the ends of the rafters are open to view. That is the moment to see whether any of them have gone soft, and to tell you what we have found.
Why timber fascias fail
A timber fascia sits behind the gutter, in the wettest line on the house. A gutter joint that drips, or a gutter that overflows every autumn, keeps that board wet all winter.
Paint holds it off for a few years. Once the paint cracks, water gets in behind it, the board swells, and the screws holding the gutter brackets lose their grip. That is when the gutter starts to sag and the drips get worse.
Guttering, downpipes and where the water goes
Guttering is the easy part to see and an easy part to get wrong. It needs a fall towards the downpipe, brackets close enough together to stop it sagging, and joints seated properly.
Downpipes take the water to a gully or a drain. A downpipe emptying onto a path, or into a gully that is blocked, puts all that water back against the wall. That is often what caused the damp patch showing inside.
Cladding, apex boards and the bits people forget
Cladding covers a timber panel, usually on a gable or the side of a dormer, that would otherwise want painting every few years. Apex boards are the two boards meeting at the point of a gable.
Both are often the last painted timber left on a house. Doing them while the access is already up means nothing is left half finished and nothing needs going back to.
Where this work is covered
We cover roofline work from Surrey, in Crawley, Brighton, Horsham, Reigate, Redhill and Dorking. If the house sits outside that list, ring and ask first.
Horsham housing is older and more mixed, plenty of it still has painted timber at the eaves, and heavy tree cover keeps that timber wet.
How the job goes
What happens when we do your fascias and soffits
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01Look from underneath
Most of a fascia can be judged from the ground. A sagging gutter, peeling paint, green staining down the wall and a soffit that has dropped at one end.
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02Sort the access
A ladder or a tower does most runs. A high or awkward one needs a scaffold, and we tell you that at the estimate, not after the work starts.
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03Old timber off
Fascia, soffit and gutter come off together. With the rafter ends open, anything soft or rotten gets seen and sorted before a new board goes anywhere near it.
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04New boards on
UPVC fascia and soffit go on with vents, so air can still get into the loft at the eaves. Boards are fixed with matching pins rather than nailed through the face.
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05Gutter, downpipe, water test
New guttering is set to a fall towards the downpipe and the joints are seated. Then water goes down it to check that it runs and does not drip.
Common questions
- Can you just replace the gutter and leave the fascia?
- Sometimes. If the board behind it is sound and painted, a new gutter on its own is fine. If the board is soft, the brackets have nothing to bite into, and the new gutter will sag exactly the way the old one did.
- What is capping over, and is it any good?
- Capping means leaving the old timber in place and covering it with a thin sheet of UPVC. It looks the same on day one. If the timber underneath is wet or rotten it stays wet, sealed in behind the new sheet. We take the old boards off instead.
- Does UPVC need painting?
- No. It is not painted, it is washed down. It does mark, and white boards go grey where trees drip on them, but soapy water and a soft brush bring them back.
- Will the loft still get air once the soffit is boxed in?
- It has to. New soffits go on with a vent strip or vented panels, so air still gets in at the eaves. Sealing a loft up is how condensation starts forming on the underlay.
- Do the boards come in anything other than white?
- Yes. White, black, grey, cream and woodgrain finishes are the usual ones, and the guttering and downpipes get matched to whatever you pick.
Roofing advice on this
Plain answers to the questions we get asked most about this work, written before you ask us for a price.
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