Scullin's houses are a good deal younger than the inner north's, but they have still sat through more than fifty Canberra winters. The suburb was built out in the late 1960s and early 1970s as Belconnen expanded, mostly single-storey brick on flat blocks, and the shutters on them were nearly all retrofitted at some point since.
We cover all of Scullin in the 2614 postcode, out to the boundaries with Page, Higgins and Hawker. Weetangera, Macquarie and Florey are on the same run through Belconnen.
Because the housing went up over a short period, the shutters fitted to it tend to be of similar vintage and to fail in similar ways. Age rather than abuse is the usual cause.
On a shutter of this age the order of failure is fairly predictable. The seal goes first and nobody notices. Then the spring softens, so the curtain feels heavier. Then the guides loosen, and that is when it jams. Most people call us at the jam, which is fair enough, but the earlier signs are easy to read once you know them. A shutter that has become noticeably harder to raise, or that creeps down after you let go, is telling you the spring is on its way out.
