Our old house in New England has a steep pitched metal roof and no gutters. Our front door is right under a roof valley, so it is unusable on rainy days and all of winter. The water running down the valley has rotted out our building sill, and we have to get it replaced. I don’t want the same thing to happen to the new sill! Installing gutters is not currently an option because the winter snow avalanches would just rip them away. I have read about snow guards, but have never seen any in real life. How well do they work, are they hard to install, will they work when 18” of snow falls on the roof? Will the snow guards slow down the avalanches enough to keep gutters in place? Alternatively, should we just build a porch to divert precipitation further from the foundation? Any advice is welcome!
You need gutters and roof guards. The gutters are the only thing that will stop water from splashing on to the side of your house which will cause rotting of any wood. Siding is not designed to protect from water going up. Roof guards will stop avalanches of snow on the roof so your gutters will be safe.