Rainguard 9309G Automatic Downspout Extension, 9-Feet, Green

Here's the deal. It works just fine. The reviewers who knock it expect too much. First, it will fill with water and it will unroll, but it all depends upon how much it rains. It is the pressure of the column of water in the downspout that makes it unroll.Let's think about the physics. I have a 5 inch gutter that runs of about 75 lin. ft. The downspout is 3" x 4" and 10 feet tall. If the downspout were to fill up completely, the weight of the water would exert almost 60 PSI. That is a huge amount of pressure and makes the extension unroll with no problem and it unrolls waaaay before the downspout fills up. The roof sheds a lot of water to the gutters in a normal rain. The extension unrolls just fine.BUT - it handles water, not leaves. When it unrolls completely the end is open and small leaves will be washed out. But if you never clean the gutters, have lots of trees, and do not have some type of gutter guards, this will plug up eventually. There is a reason your gutter is 4-5 inches and the downspout is 12 square inches in cross section. To handle debris.Next, you must accept the fact that to unroll, the gadget must not be blocked. It will roll over grass, but it will not roll "up and over" anything. It will unroll up a slight incline - and I mean slight (but if the ground slopes towards your foundation you have bigger problems).It needs a fairly flat to sloping away surface. Dead level is fine but not necessary. However, a hard slope to either side of straight out from the downspout will cause it to unroll just fine, but re-roll in a skewed manner, if at all. On a side slope, it can re-roll crooked or get hung up on itself.In summary: Used on a gently sloping lawn, where the grass is cut normally (I leave mine about 4-5 inches tall) or on a surface that is fairly compact, this works as advertised. It unrolls, and rolls back up out of the way every time.

We bought one of these around 2010, and it worked well for quite awhile. In fact, I rated it 5 stars. Following a hurricane, however,it had to be replaced. We're not at all happy with this purchase. Simply put, it does not work. We were wondering why pavers were sinking in near the Rainguard. I had suspicions that the pipe wasn't extending. Sure enough, I checked during a downpour, and the Rainguard had only extended about 1 1/2 feet. We like the fact that it rolls up after a rain since we have to attach it by a walkway. Therefore, we will try a new one. Hopefully, I can update this review more positively.

I bought these extensions because I don't like all the gutter run-off settling at the base of the downspouts, causing a muddy mess and killing the grass. I thought this would spread the water across a wider swath of lawn, and to some degree it does. However, you would really need a great deluge to get the roller to fully extend. Most of the time the roller just went out a couple of feet. You can't leave these on all year, either. You need to remove them before autumn leaves get into your gutters and wash down the drainpipe. Since the leaves can't pass into the plastic extension, the downspout gets totally backed up!Overall, I think you are equally well served with flat downspout trays. I still have a set of these and will use them, but now I know that they only can last through one spring and summer. Then they have to be removed, and probably replaced the next spring. It could get a little expensive.

This product seems to be an enhancement of a product my father had used 50 years ago. It sorta-kinda worked then, and it sorta-kinda works now. It always seems to extend, it sometimes chooses to retract. Half the time it partially retracts unevenly, then gets stuck. When it does so, as another reviewer mentioned, if its during summer heat the grass underneath is toast, pun intended. The coup de gras was my wife saying it looked cheap and to get it off there. It was not worth the money, in my opinion. I purchased it for its ability to get out of way and not interfere with the movement of a trash can nearby. I may cut it up and pair it with a rigid extension to try to solve the problem without the whole extension-retraction thing going on.

I like this item very much. I purchased three of them years ago to replace "fold down" downspout extenders that had hinged elbows at the bottom of my downspouts that had 3 ft pieces of downspout attached, that I folded down during rainy days. Those types are great for the back of my house which is enclosed behind the fences, but not so good for the front of the house where visitors and delivery people were walking. Sometimes I would get home and find that the downspouts were Knocked off of the house, most likely somebody tripped over them, or bumped into them, because they were angled down across my walkway. That is why I love these automatic downspout extenders. They have been working great for about three years now. When it rains, the water from the downspout fills into the Raingaurd, which makes it roll out away from the house as it disperses the water. Then, as the rain lets up, it slowly rolls itself back and sits there and waits until more rain comes, then it rolls out again, over and over, for years. I ran over one while trying to put out my green recycle bin which was completely full and had to go out. but, it was raining heavily that day, and I didn't want to forget to put that green bin out (again,) so without thinking, I rolled the green bin over the Rainguard wheels and broke the wheel, or axel part. I was able to put it together in such a way that it still rolled back after the rain stopped, but I still ordered a replacement right away. Why four stars and not five? There is a "re-usable" zip tie that is used to attach it to your downspout, but it broke as I was trying to zip it closed (it was very brittle.) I was lucky enough to have some zip ties that I could use as a replacement. Even with the brittle zip tie problem, I feel that these Rainguard extensions are an excellent product. Thanks.