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Siding advice from a self-professed wood snob

Q. I own a Cape built in 1966. It had new wood siding about 25 years ago, and a paint job lasts only about 14 months. I am a senior citizen and want a suggestion for new siding that doesn’t need upkeep. Thanks in advance.

GIOIA CLYDE, Littleton

A. Your house is my age — and your 25-year-old siding is now old siding. I wish I were 25 again. Hmmm, what would I have done differently?

Seriously, a good paint job should last more than 14 months. I’d say a high-quality paint application should last at least six years, even longer if maintained and touched up along the way. Hire a trustworthy painter who pays attention to the details.

Once the house is brought back to its original luster, wait three or four years and then paint one side a year, taking care of any repairs at that time as well. This way the house finish is never in any significant disrepair or needing a major paint job again.

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So you’d rather have low-maintenance siding? (I’m a wood snob, so I prefer wood siding.) I do not recommend vinyl siding. One alternative is fiber-
cement board, which can look like clapboard lap siding or shingles. Fiber-cement-board is better formulated than vinyl or wood-based siding to stand up to both everyday and extreme weather conditions.

One cool feature of this siding is that it’s fire-resistant and has been accepted by hurricane-zone building codes for homes in hurricane- and wildfire-prone areas. You can order this siding prefinished with a baked paint. Unlike vinyl, fiber-cement siding resists burning, melting, sagging, and fading, and unlike wood-based, it resists warping, rotting, cracking, and burning.

As a carpenter, I hate installing this stuff. It’s heavy and hard to cut, and the dust from cutting is just nasty. Additionally, fiber-cement board and vinyl present a problem that wood siding does not: If water gets behind fiber-cement siding, your house can rot without you knowing it. With wood siding, water infiltration shows up as paint blisters, failure, and visible rot.

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Q. I have decided that the clapboards on my house are just too old and require too much maintenance to keep them looking good. We plan to replace them with HardiePlank lap siding. I have 8-inch corner boards and trim up at the top of the house (frieze boards, soffits, bed molding, rake molding). This all needs a good scraping and painting. What is your opinion on replacing the trim? Is it better to go with PVC or wood? (HardiePlank is neither PVC nor wood, right? Isn’t it fiber-cement board?)

If we keep the window trim and corner boards, do you think these should be repainted before the new siding goes up? Then the siding can be butted up to them and caulked. This sounds like the right way to me. Thank you.

PAT

A. Again, I’m a carpenter, so I prefer wood, but if you’re going with low-maintenance siding, then why not got for it on the trim as well? Another option here is PVC, a plastic that lasts a long, long, long time. I’d balance your decision on how long you plan on staying in that house.

A word of caution with fiber-cement siding: Make sure your contractor follows the manufacturer’s recommendations for installation, including proper nailing, priming the cut ends, and flashing all seams. I’m hearing and seeing more and more installation failures due to carpenters not using the proper techniques.

If you decide to keep the corner boards, the ends could definitely benefit from painting. If possible, gently try to pry the corner boards and trim off the house sheathing and run tar paper splines 1½ inches behind the trim, leaving 1½ inches to go under the new clapboard siding as joint flashing. This is the time to replace all of the door and window trim as well. Good luck!

Rob Robillard is a general contractor, carpenter, editor of AConcordCarpenter.com, and principal of a carpentry and renovation business. Send your questions to homerepair@globe.com or tweet them to @globeaddress or @robertrobillard.

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