On 16 Aug, 14:23, On net wrote:
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?

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.