Would someone (who has actually solved this problem) tell me what they did to cover the portion of the ICF foam that is above the painted on, sprayed or sheet waterproofing that is below grade and the house’s panelling above grade by 6 inches to a foot? You can’t simply leave the form’s foam surface exposed since this defeats the effort of applying waterproffing, looks poor and will result in UV and physical breakdown. Did you apply something like cement board siding or underlayemnt board? Thanks.
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Parge with cement.
I use a metal flashing made up that i attach below grade and fasten onto the walls before siding.
Many ICF manufacturers provide a synthetic parging product, along with nylon mesh to set between two coats. This works very well. I trick I've learned along the way is to use cheap regular thinset at $8 a bag, versus the $30 dollar a bag stuff from the supplier. It goes on nicer, and holds up just fine.
I put a flashing all around the house at the sill plate location. This flashing was pre formed and I then put sheet metal underneath the flashing and shaped to the contour of the land. I riveted the panels to the flashing. See Picture (never mind the land mines). PS, I have EPS insulation panels vice ICF but the principle is the same. I may have to renew the sheet metal in 10-15 years due to degradation of the aluminum as is contacts soil in some areas, but it only took me 3 hours to fit all of the panels.
Edited 3/23/2009 4:27 pm ET by losh
On my house I installed a brick ledge and added stone.
did one with 12" hardie board siding covering the foam.i'm not sure how good this is,if it needs replacing someday no big deal. what i didn't like about it was it made a great tunnel for little critters and you would never see them.
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