Gutter for barn

We installed vinyl gutter on one side of the barn last year and it came out pretty good but there was one thing that I would like to do differently as we are going to install the gutter on the other side of the barn soon. I was given a guideline of a 1/16" drop for every foot from the far end to the downspout side which amounts to about 1 1/2" inches total for my 24 foot length of gutter. I found this a little difficult to get right as 1 1/2 inches of "play" is not a lot. What I have now is a gutter that will usually hold a little rain in it and doesn't clear out as good as it should. This time around I would like to avoid that. My question is can I make this drop over the length of my 24 foot gutter more than an 1 1/2 inches to get this to drain better? I do realize if I make the drop over the length of gutter too much that the water could overtake the downspout and other end of the gutter and possibly cause splashing. Is this 1/16 of an inch per foot of gutter a good rule of thumb that I was initially given? I think I would l like to make it a little bit more for this next install as long as it doesn't cause too quick a flow to the downspout end. Thanks!

 

Yes, you can pitch the gutter more. The main problem is that it starts to look crooked or you run out of fascia height. One thing that can help is putting a downspout at either end and have the high spot is in the middle.

 

Thanks for the reply, Dane. I hadn't thought of the creating the pitch from the center outwards which sounds good although a little more material. In this application, I want the downspout on the 1 side of the barn only as I intend to dig a drain in the Spring and tie both gutters to it. This barn borders some horse pasture area that seems to be consistently wet soggy ground and this time of year any add'l water never seems to dry out in that area creating a muddy mess with the horses. I think I will create a little more pitch on this 2nd installation but just be careful not to create too much of a pitch. I am also going to go back to the 1st gutter and see how close I was to the inch and a half pitch over the 24 foot run and maybe go 2 1/2" this time. Thanks again for the feedback!!

 

Using a chalk line to establish a straight line for reference would help keep the gutter aligned. Also check the roof for level from one end to the other. The pitch should be based on a level reference from end to end. Hope this makes sense.