New Gutters for the Historic Jamestowne Church

The Restoration Department has started the process of rain gutter installation on the Memorial Church on Historic Jamestowne Island. After scaffold set up, the crew scraped loose paint from the wood cornice,then washed it with TSP to remove dirt and oxidized paint. After a day of drying, the cornice was painted with an alkyd primer. The next step will be caulk and a latex top coat. Only after proper cornice preparation will the gutter installation begin. While the crew waits for paint to dry, it has several broken slate shingles to replace. We are also adding "snow catchers" just above the newly to be installed gutters, because we do not wish to revisit this job after it is done. 132 snow catchers were required to do both sides of the 55 foot long church. Since stainless steel snow catchers were half the price of copper, they were ordered. The crew will paint them black before they are installed. The catchers are for a "retrofit" roof, meaning they have long straps with downward sloping grooves in their sides, designed to slide under slates and hook onto their nails. The gutters themselves are 6 inch, half-round aluminum, factory finished in a "Mansard Brown" color, to mimic the look of weathered copper. They will be hung from stainless steel straps attached to the roof sheathing, which necessitates the removal and re-installation of the lower shingle courses. We estimate the job will require three technicians about two weeks per side, if the weather is kind.