Gutter Cleaner

thingiverse

After my mother had a fall, my wife and I move up to the grand farmhouse to help her get back on her feet. This has turned out to be a long term change for us as our own kids have taken over the family home. So, I get cracking and sort out all the wee jobs needing done around a large house that has missed the capable hands of a blokey bloke to do. Some weeks later, I am sitting comfortably one afternoon, feeling smug about the numerous jobs I have just completed when my brother comes over from the neighbouring house. "Yo, Jock, get off yer arse and get those gutters cleaned out!", he nods his head towards the vast length of guttering two stories up, some of which is showing signs of quite mature vegetation sprouting from it. "You know I don't like ladders don't you?", I reply shuddering slightly at memories of standing two stories up on a wooden ladder with advanced woodworm and no cognisance of health nor safety. "Tough, needs done, go do!" he replies, never being one to waste words when possible. He points towards the same set of wooden ladders that tormented me some 30 years ago, this time with the woodworm long since extinct but evidence of their excavation very much apparent. He laughed and walked off. Right, thinks I, and jump straight onto Google to find a solution. Disappointingly all I could find was either attachments for pressure washers (no way to get a hosepipe all the way round the house) or some £1.5M robot that could not turn corners. It was then that I decided to plunder Thingiverse for a tool, and while I do not decry the efforts of others, I was a bit disappointed by what was on offer. Where is the elegance, the grace, the aesthetic? Fusion 360 leaps into view, with my brother standing outside holding a rickety ladder in one hand, pointing at me with the other while making 'orrible laughing noises, I set to work. It is difficult to work out how to loft an oval section to a rectangular section over a pre-defined curve (giving a 15 degree angle away from the wall) while a threat of likely injury looms; but I managed it. Enjoy, I hope it proves to be useful and if I can save one life, then a beer is fair exchange. In use, you just hook it into the gutter and drag it along. If you get the angle right all the muck is displaced and lands on the ground a meter or two away from you. Heavy or solid items can be shovelled out a little bit at a time. In my experience the larger lumps of vegetation tend to break away and fall as a single satisfying glob. It is designed to fit onto the excellent Darlac pole saw pole but I'm sure the bottom part could be removed and made to fit onto other things.