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Discussion Forum

Rain screen details for exterior siding

Gene_Davis | Posted in Construction Techniques on August 9, 2008 08:39am

Is it worth it to do all the stuff like battens and rainscreen wrap?

There are houses here with 120-year-old wood siding, and nothing behind it like what the rainscreen proponents call out.  In places like Litchfield, CT, some of the siding work is at almost twice that old.

What’s this all about?

 

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“A stripe is just as real as a dadgummed flower.”

Gene Davis        1920-1985

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  1. frammer52 | Aug 09, 2008 10:55pm | #1

    Gene as a fellow NYer, I wouldn't bother with rain screen.  I am with you on this one.  I have sided too many houses without and without any problems.

    1. BoJespersen1 | Aug 10, 2008 02:43am | #4

      I have read and seen siding last longer painted and unpainted (cedar) with a rain screen. Also, cedar shingles, a staple here in cold country, reacts poorly to direct contact w/ housewrap and reduces it's weathering ability by something like 10-15%!!I think those #'s were from an unfinished shingle though~

      Edited 8/9/2008 7:44 pm ET by BoJespersen1

      1. frammer52 | Aug 10, 2008 02:52am | #5

        I think I can understand why you use a rainscreen, I just think in this part of the country, it is overkill.

      2. JohnCujie | Aug 10, 2008 02:55am | #6

        How do you put sidewall shingles on rain screen? I thought rain screen was thin battens attached to the studs.John

        1. Westcoast | Aug 10, 2008 03:12am | #7

          You either have to cross strap it or use a product liker rainslicker. Either way it is totally overkill for shingles. You can put shingles on a roof with felt underneath and get twenty years of life so putting them on a sidewall would make one think that there should be no problem.Has anyone ever seen any kind of problem with sidewall shingles?

          1. BoJespersen1 | Aug 10, 2008 04:17pm | #8

            What is a side wall shingle? Where they meet at an ext corner?

          2. fingersandtoes | Aug 10, 2008 09:53pm | #11

            "Side wall shingles" just refers to the grade. They aren't for roofing. 

          3. Westcoast | Aug 10, 2008 09:59pm | #14

            Haha! sorry didn't see you posted until after i did!

          4. BoJespersen1 | Aug 11, 2008 02:53am | #19

            Gotcha...in the shower I thought I had figured it out...maybe what you call "side walls" we call cheek walls. But, now it makes perfect sense!For what it is worth, I built in Lake Tahoe for 3 years and all roof shingles ("shakes" out there) were on horizontal furring strips.

          5. Westcoast | Aug 10, 2008 09:58pm | #13

            Sidewall shingles is referring to a No.2 grade or No.1 rejects that can't be used on a roof but perfectly suitable for walls.

          6. Piffin | Aug 10, 2008 10:49pm | #15

            Those of us with a background in roofing tend to call them side wall shingles when used as siding. 

             

            Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!

          7. JohnCujie | Aug 11, 2008 02:57am | #20

            We use no. 1's for sidewall. They are not rejects of any kind and can be used for roofing or siding.John

          8. Piffin | Aug 11, 2008 03:36am | #21

            Since a wall does not see much streaming water, it is a good place for minor blemishes, esp in the upper half of the shingle. 

             

            Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!

          9. Westcoast | Aug 11, 2008 05:21am | #22

            Hi John, when i say rejects that is a bit harsh for description. No. 1's have to be 18" long and the rejects I buy for walls are a minimum of 16" to 18" but just can't be certified "blue label No. 1 Grade"

          10. Piffin | Aug 10, 2008 07:01pm | #9

            "You can put shingles on a roof with felt underneath and get twenty years of life "Pray tell?;)westcoast screen name suggests maybe you are in the arid west climate, but who knows, maybe the pacific northwet where they can rot out in 7-8 years on felt?It does have a lot to do with climate, but laid over homeslicker or rainslicker or strapping they can last twice as long, be that 8 years or forty.I have seen problems in cedar sidewall shingles twice. Both time s it was when they had been painted with oil and no breathing space behind not backpriming. They were rotting from the back and sopping wet. Water that blew in through the surface remained, not able to dry out through the oil paint seal 

             

            Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!

          11. Westcoast | Aug 10, 2008 09:56pm | #12

            Hi Piffin, i am on the "Wet"coast! Yes pacific northwest lots and lots of rain. I was just driving through an old subdivision i built eight homes around 1990 1991. I know the one original owner but all the others are second third etc. All of the roofs are looking like they have a five year or under lifespan left.
            Three of those houses have shingles on the gable ends and they look so good other than the one house where after years of being natural stained they have darkened so much and it doesn't look natural anymore.
            I was asking about sidewall shingles because i have still not seen an issue once, i have no doubt they are out there though. Just struck me as odd that the sidewall shingles maybe see 5% of the moisture that the roof shingles do.I am in B.C. here and we have to use a rainscreen on new homes to pass code. Only on coditioned living space though, so no gables are not needed to be done.

          12. Piffin | Aug 10, 2008 10:56pm | #16

            are these red cedar? The white cedars around here are lucky to last twenty years sometimes and do show their age starting early.In West Texas, white cedars could go forty years if they didn't get hailed out.The reds have better oils for resisting rot so I assume tht is what you have used. 

             

            Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!

          13. fingersandtoes | Aug 10, 2008 11:52pm | #17

            We don't have white cedar, only red and yellow. Yellow is rare enough that it is only used for furniture and carving. Red cedar shake blocks are valuable enough that there is a constant cat and mouse between rustlers and the RCMP in the bush all over the island.

          14. Westcoast | Aug 11, 2008 12:38am | #18

            Yes red cedar dominates around here.

  2. Piffin | Aug 09, 2008 11:24pm | #2

    There are some differences.

    The wood today is not as good. Flat sawn plantation grown instead of quartered virgin heartwood

    The paint today is half as good - no oil to seal water out, no lead to kill micro-organisms

    The old houses had no insulation so there was heat and air moving through walls to dry them out. Remember the old adage that "A house has to 'breathe'"? Take an old house and tighten it up and suddenly there is rot appearing sometimes.

    and whole there are a lot of grand old houses still doing fine that never had wrap and rainscreen, there are a lot more that have failed and fallen, with others holding the middle ground of having been repaired much. I know, I have been repairing them.

    Is a rainscreen needed? Not necessarily, but it is a better house with than without

     

     

    Welcome to the
    Taunton University of
    Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime.
     where ...
    Excellence is its own reward!

  3. gzajac | Aug 10, 2008 02:18am | #3

    Gene

    We are doing our first rainscreen frame and it is a little complicated and time consuming. It looks like we have boiler plate details from Cora-vent and another set of details from the Architect, that don't match.

    I like new challenges, but the window details are a little iffy, and I can see water issues on the horizon. I will voice my concerns to the builder, maybe he will see the details in a different light.

    We are putting hardi board clapboards over this, probably would be more beneficial for cedar clapboards or wood shingles. At this point in time , I enjoy just having something to do.

     

    Greg in Connecticut

  4. fingersandtoes | Aug 10, 2008 08:01pm | #10

    We have to use rainscreen on all residential construction. It makes sense here in the PNW because your siding can be wet from October to May. Mandating rainscreen was a response to widespread envelope failures that allowed water to penetrate walls and damage the framing.

    If you don't see those problems around you, the effort and money is probably better spent on something else like better insulation. However, I'm not sure looking at really old houses in your area gives a good indication of how new ones will perform. Old un-insulated wood frame had a tremendous capacity to dry because of the air movement through it. Modern more airtight construction often does not allow trapped moisture a path to escape.

    One of the advantages of rainscreen is that you can provide gaps in your exterior sheathing, behind the house wrap or paper, which allow the wall to dry to the rainscreen airspace. Coupled with a good interior air barrier, this provides a quite forgiving wall system that can cope with what moisture that does get into it.

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