Archive for March, 2008...
Filed under General Roofing & Siding
I posted earlier this week regarding what to use to cap off your stone siding if you’re only going up the wall part way, a type of Wainscoting if you will. There are literally a plethora of different kinds of siding you can use to compliment each other.
Many people who use stone , do so because they’re looking for a low maintenance product, so to compliment that product it would make sense to use another like fiber cement. The wide selection of available profiles such as lap siding and shingle ’s gives you many design options, this photo gives you the idea of what I’m talking about.
Cheers,
David Tomson
Filed under General Roofing & Siding
These days people are installing more that one type of siding onto their home. This could be for a number of reasons such as cost or they just don’t want to have too much of a good thing. One way to get around this with the stone is with a ledge or trim or cap or whatever you want to call it. It is a pretty common stone to use and is usually hidden under the name of ‘Window Sill’. Most commonly 18-20 inches long and sticks out from the wall almost twice the depth of the actual stone. They are usually made to allow for water to run off of them. There are a a multitude of different sidings that you can use depending on your taste, although you really just have to decide Vertical or Horizontal.
Although there are basic trims that you can get to separate the 2 types of siding the best way is with this trim shown in this photo. This for anyone that is wondering was done in our Ready Stack Rustic Suede. In my opinion one of the best looking stones available, although some of that has to do with how it matches the rest of the theme on the home.
Cheers,
Dave Tomson
Filed under Fiber Cement Siding, General Roofing & Siding
Is a mountain of rotten wood or faded vinyl siding decorating your front lawn? Now before you dive into your new project, Cape-Cod cedar shingles or Fiber Cement lap siding, take a good look at the condition of your structure. While you or your installer is dismantling the outside of your home, you have an excellent opportunity to inspect the condition of the structure of your building . This is general for all trades really. I would say that usually you’ll uncover some nasty truths about the state of a home during reno projects.
Most of the problems surrounding siding are water related. More often than not, with lap siding anyways, the damage is a result of wind driven rain getting through the butt joints. Maybe you find that your tar paper or (in some cases newspaper) has very little life left in it and the structural timbers are wet or even beginning to rot. Although it probably isn’t in the budget, fix this stuff while you have the chance, seek it out and repair it. Put your siding off for two days and tend to any thing you find in disrepair. The other option is pretty bleak, i.e removing your new siding in 6 months to fix an old problem.
As far as a builders tips go “Ask the Builder” is providing some good information on installation techniques to ensure that water stays out of your butt joints. He uses a miniature flashing behind the caulking, pretty clever.
Filed under General Roofing & Siding
Hi all you weekend warriors,
Is your Fireplace looking looking like it needs a little something?
Well maybe you need to get stoned. No no that doesn’t mean what you think. I mean do something on your walls. The best is if you have an existing fire place because then you have about half your work done and here is a good step by step way to go about it. This is of course if you have an existing fireplace.
If you don’t have an existing fireplace an easy way to go about it is to use an electric unit gas is fine too but more expensive, either one will fit your budget. With electric you will need to do 1 of 2 things, either recess it into the wall or build it out from the wall. Unless you have walls with tons of dead space behind it you will likely be building it out. You will have to check with your local building codes to figure out if you can do this first of all but also to see if there will be any hang ups with your install. You don’t want surprises. No with interior installations you can go either way with your installation, the best is with a scratch coat. This is comprised of a wire mesh and mortar to give the stone something to adhere to. The link above gives a really good step by step on how to do this.
Doing stone on the inside you can cheat a little. You don’t want to mortar this stone to drywall because it will absorb the moisture and fall apart. What you can do is once you have it all framed out and secured down so when the stone is on it, it won’t fall down. You can begin ‘cheating’. What I mean by this is the stones adhere to the scratch coat because it is a rough cement surface and the mortar grabs onto it well. Since your fire place is inside and not exposed to the elements then you can go ahead and use cement board. This will give you that rough surface to adhere to and since it isn’t drywall it won’t fall apart from the moisture in the mortar.
When you are done you can have something like this and give your place an updated touch that looks great without breaking the bank.
Good luck,
Dave Tomson
