I have a 1950’s house we bought that has aluminum siding on it that is in need of replacement. My thought was to remove the aluminum siding, the wood siding under it and the brown fiber (nail?) board. This would allow me to insulate the 2×4 exterior walls. I have discovered, after removing the aluminum, that the siding underneath is cedar plank.
I was looking for opinions on whether to leave the cedar and blow in insulation, or continue to remove the cedar siding and resheath the house after installing roll insulation
Replies
I think you might get better answers here by getting a bit more specific:
Is is cedar bevel lap siding under the aluminum? Or is the cedar "plank" you are referring to the sheathing? If it's cedar plank, do you mean it's verticle as in board and batten siding? How do you know it's cedar? Where are you?
Any jackass can kick down a barn, but it takes a carpenter to build one.
The siding is cedar plank, and it runs horizontal. I have had a couple of people look at it and we all think it is cedar. It is not the sheathing on the house. It is what I believe is the original siding. Under it is what I think use to be called nail board
The cedar lap siding on your house is maybe ok, just remove the aluminum, remove a few laps of cedar, blow in the cells insulation and replace those laps, then repair and paint the original siding.
The original siding is surely damaged from the aluminum installation, all the drip caps will need to be replaced over each window and door, and the 1 million aluminum nails will need to be pulled out, or driven in, and then the holes puttied up.
If you are gonna contract out any of this, I would recommend to remove the aluminum siding first, then see what things look like underneath before finally deciding what you are gonna do with it because the siding might be in great condition, or in may be all rotted (either from lack of maintainence before the alu. was installed, or from some flaw in the alu. install that allowed rain water behind it.
The cedar that is on a '50s house is likely to be of higher quality than what is available today (more old growth), so is probably worth trying to save.
One problem that occurs with painted wood siding is paint peel from excess moisture transfer from the living space, but using a low-permeable insulation like cellulose should help with that (in a new install you want to prime all six sides of each board, and install furring strips to put an air gap between your siding and your sheething, but that's not an option when trying to save original cedar siding, so that's why I mention about the cellulose).
Good luck,
Norm "save the plaster, save the siding" Kerr