Preventing rot in cedar siding.. observations and questions before paint

240sx4u · 10-31-2008, 12:37 AM

Alright, obviously I have been working alot on this project. I have decided to replace about 30' of siding on the front of the house that is just too labor intensive to fix. I am finding that every pinhole in the paint from finish nails or whatever has let water in and has left rot.

I am going to clean it out as best as I can, but don't want more to occur in the future. This obviously means not penetrating the barrier that the paint provides.

My biggest question comes to the corners where the metal pieces are used to cover the ends of the siding. Almost every board has rot there, and somewhat serious rot. Is there something I can do to prevent this? Caulking that metal piece to the siding perhaps? I may have to pull them off to get all the rot out.

Thanks guys, I am losing momentum.. as I work across it almost seems to be getting worse and worse as far as siding condition. I really wish the PO's had taken better care of this house.

Evan

Matthewt1970 · 10-31-2008, 01:29 PM

Ugg, you have alluminum trim but wood siding? If all the boards are rotted where it meets the trim then you had water get in behind the trim. Any time you get mosture behind alluminum it takes forever to dry out. Yes you need to seal those areas but I am more concerned with you mentioning that every place they nailed is rotted too. I am begining to think your siding may not be cedar. It would be strange but not impossible to get that much rot from Cedar. Don't get me wrong, Cedar can and will rot, but I can't remember coming across a house that was in as bad of condition as you are mentioning. When you wrap trim with alluminum, you are only supposed to nail it along the edges and then silicone over it.

240sx4u · 10-31-2008, 01:33 PM

Matthew, I may be over stating the problem. I tend to get overwhelmed. I have NO idea how long its been since this house was painted and the paint has been missing for almost a decade I would guess. It smells like cedar, thats for sure.

Not every spot where there is a nail is rotted, but it seems like they didn't set the nails and caulk with a quality caulk. Caused the nails to pop a bit and break the already crap painted surface.

The trim I am referring to is on the outside corners of the house where two walls meet. Seems the paint cracked at that junction and has let lots of moisture in. Ill try to get photos when I get home tonight. It must be galvanized steel because its showing very minor rust

Thanks - Evan

240sx4u · 11-03-2008, 08:42 AM

Well after another solid 8 hours of scraping and prep I have a better idea of what has happened. The end caps on the corners of the house had the paint crack and allow water in. I broke the seams open, scraped away offending paint and applied PC rot to the wood. That stuff turns soft rotted wood into rock solid useable substrate.

I also found that much of what I though was rot was really discoloration. I spot primed the bare wood and will do a full coat of paint as soon as I can. Pretty much the best I could do with the time I have left for the season. I am trying to protect what is still there at this point, even if the look isn't picture perfect (IE scraped areas painted over leaves an uneven texture).

I am going to do the front of the house, spot prime the rest and leave it for winter. I have a feeling this underlying blue paint is going to start rising. It has already happened on one wall I painted in a few places. There is a possibility it was loosely adhered paint that I didn't find the first go around though.

Time will tell, if this stuff looks like hell by spring I will plan on stripping the entire house.

One thing disturbing was that in the heat, the old paint seemed to come off somewhat easily. (when the sun was shining).

Evan