Original Organic Gutter Mate Unique Plastic Strong Filter Diverter for water butts (White, Brown & Black) (Brown)

I now have 2 of these. While most water butts come with a diverter I recommend this one. It may be a bit more expensive but it is well made and filters out the rubbish coming off the roof. Clear instructions available (on the website) and if you follow the instructions to the millimetre you will be fine. Thoroughly recommended!

We are amazed how much water we are collecting from the bathroom. Not a single drop of rain has fallen yet but the flowers seem happy with bathroom water rather than dying.

I feel a bit mean giving this only 3 stars - I'd probably give it 7/10 overall. I do think it's a good idea. It looks as if it will collect water far more efficiently from the downpipe than the standard diverter does (I have not connected it to the water butt yet, hence the plug on the outlet that can be seen in the photos) and it's good that it will filter out leaves and similar as it does so. My main issue with it is one of quality vs price. Basically, it's a few bits of plastic, yet it now (July 2019) costs £34 plus £6 delivery, so £40 to your door. For that, it would be good if the plastic was at least solid, but it's quite thin and a bit bendy. The first photo shows that the back of the top section bows inwards. This means that when it's in place, the bowing pushes the top section backwards away from the down pipe at the top, which in turn tends to lift it away from the bottom section at the front, as can be seen in the second photo. The bottom section is clamped to the wall, but the top section just sits on top: there are no clips and it only weighs a few grams so not a lot to hold it in place. I live in a windy coastal area and, installed as per the instructions, I wouldn't give a lot for its chances of not blowing away. Photo three shows that I have overcome the bowing by wedging a bit of wood behind it (a temporary fix as that will go rotten) and I've used a loop of nylon line to connect it to bottom section's bracket so that (hopefully) it can't blow away.The instructions say the downpipe should protrude about 2/3mm into the top of the filter. I presume this is to allow it to be pushed upwards to clear out the filter from time to time. With hindsight, I'd have left a bigger overlap because I think that would make the whole thing more secure. It would be possible to make the top section taller so that it could both be slid upwards for cleaning easily but still be held in place by the downpipe, and I think that would be a cheap and worthwhile improvement.I can't comment on its long-term survival. Hopefully the plastic, though thin, is good quality and UV resistant.

These are effective and much easer to clean than any other diverters I have tried. If you have a lot of fine particles washed off your roof it may be worth buying an additional fine filter (or making one). Rather than the corrugated hose supplied, I have used rigid overflow pipe to connect to water butts, with a short length of plastic hose and a couple of hose clips to connect between the overflow and the Gutter Mate outlet.The only reason for not giving five stars is that the fitting instructions are unnecessarily complicated. The easy way is:1. note the line on the outside of the Gutter Mate which shows the water level at which the water will discharge down the drain;2. fix the Gutter Mate to the wall so that this line is level with where you want the top of the water in the butt to be.3. Once that is done it is a simple matter temporarily to remove the Gutter Mate if necessary while fitting the lower length of down pipe (only one bracket should be needed as the bottom of the Gutter Mate will hold the top of the pipe)4. then fit the upper length (you may need an extra bracket for this as it hangs loose from the rest of the works beneath it).I have found that sloping the bottom of the upper pipe slightly upwards towards the front makes it easier to insert and remove the top of the Gutter Mate for cleaning while ensuring that the upper pipe is well within the top of the Gutter Mate.

Hi,I brought this after reading up that you can physically divert the water to either your water butt or straight through.However it appears they have changed the model because in YT videos it done exactly that.But when I received it it didn’t have this facility and it would always divert to the butt then once that’s full it would back up and then flow down the gutter pipe.Although this is what most people want it’s not what I wanted and so returned for no quibble refund and purchased a more expensive item to do the job…Based on what I received it seems a bit flimsy and not worth the quote high price. Also you have to buy the finer filters if that’s what you want.