Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Siding transplant

The exterior painting job is moving along -- as long as my latest scheme will work.

I am transplanting siding.

The south side of the house has some really warped boards -- split and pulling away from the frame.


This is a 1939 house with its original siding, so I can't get any boards with that profile without paying for custom work. That's when I realized I might have some pristine siding tucked away somewhere else.

My enclosed back porch has the "donor" siding.

I pulled off some crappy paneling off one wall the other evening and found it in excellent condition. Now I have to figure out how to extract it.



It's old, dry and nailed firmly into the wall. I started to tug at it, and some of the wood split.

Here's my plan: With a skinny and flexible saw, I'll get under the reveal, cut the nails, then use either a reciprocating saw (something I've never used before) or a hand saw to cut away swaths of siding. I need to have long enough planks to replace about four or five areas on the south side and more on the equally weather-worn west side.

But this opens another DIY can of worms. I'll be pulling apart the back porch walls. I can use this opportunity to install insulation (glory be!) and put up proper drywall. That also means moving the laundry unit, displacing my tool storage and potentially finding more problems in those old walls.

Any advice on siding transplants?




2 comments:

  1. I had to replace a couple of clapboards on my 1887 Queen Anne cottage after I tore off the ugly cedar shingles covering the original siding. We used "donor siding" from a house that had been torn down. To remove the damaged clapboards, we used a Stanley WonderBar to get under the clapboard, then we cut the nails & sawed out the damaged clapboards. It takes a little time & patience to get 'em out of there without breaking them. Good luck!

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  2. I like the way it says "transplant" and looks great after the replacement, I also try this with hardiplank siding houston in some areas in homes. Cool post

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