Removing Replacing Wood Siding
Hi Everyone: This is my first posting to this forum....great information posted on this site. Anyway I have an older home (60 plus years). Two of the 4 walls are covered with wood siding (each siding is about 9 wide x 7 high). Some of the siding is warped, cracked, or just plain old. I want to replace some of it. The 2 questions I have are: (1) What is the best way to remove the older siding? I read elsewhere that they suggest using a slater ripper or slater bar. This thing looks pretty destructive for replacing siding, but what do I know. Others suggest using a small pry bar and a hack saw blade to cut the nail. I want something that is somewhat quick, easy to use, and it does the job properly. (2) The other question is what do you suggest as replacement siding? Is it advisable to use the type of siding they sell at the large retail outlets for roof shingles? Thank you Welcome to the forums!! Before you start, see if you can obtain the replacement materials. Nothing would be worse than doing a demo, just to find 60 year old wood can't be matched up. Generally to remove siding of that age, and of wood, either a reciprocating saw with a metal blade or a Multimaster is used to shear off the nails to where the siding can be slipped down. Now, you need to clarify the size. 9 x 7 ain't very big. I am assuming this is clapboard type siding 9 feet long, not inches. Maybe you could post a few pictures of your project so we can see what you see. http://www.doityourself.com/forum/el...your-post.html It sounds like you must have vertical 1x10 tg v-groove siding. That stuff has a tendency to warp, bow out and split. Depending on whether or not you want to save any of the old siding, you may or may not have to be careful in ripping it off. If you are just wanting to remove it, a wrecking bar and hammer is probably all you need. Maybe a cat's paw to dig out a few of the face nails will help too. Getting the first piece off will be the trick, so identify which piece was the last one installed (should be ripped down to size) and remove that piece first. Then just work your way down the wall, getting behind the siding and prying outward to loosen the nails. If you are thinking of removing just a few sections, and replace with an accent strip of wood shingles, or something- then you would probably take a skilsaw and rip a piece in half vertically so that you could then remove both the tongue and the groove portions as two separate pieces. Then you'd have a starting point to start tearing off siding in either direction. I'm guessing you are thinking of using wood shingles to replace your siding? If so, that's fine. Usually you will want to paper the wall just as you would a roof, applying a layer of felt, then a couple rows of shingles, then a layer of felt, then a couple rows of shingles, and so on. Asking what kind of siding we think you should use is kind of a hard question. Kind of like asking us what color we think you should paint your house. Maybe some of those pictures like Larry mentioned would help. Thank you for your quick replies. I incuded a photo in Photobucket. It is a picture of the siding for the garage but the house is the same. I never took a piece of the wall siding off but it doesn't look like it is a long piece as in many feet long. The pieces appear alternating in length. The thing about taking these sidings off is that the nail is the upper portion of the siding and the siding immediately above the peice I want to remove overlaps the nail. So getting to the nail is the tricky part. I have no intention of saving the older siding. The siding is all painted so it is not a stained siding. In otherwords the original siding must simply match in size but not necessarily color. The siding does not look like TG but again I never took one off to examine it closely. I don't know if I can easily get a Skillsaw lie flat against the wall so that the blade can reach up to the area it needs to cut. Any thoughts? Thank you for your comments and suggestions Exterior Wall Siding :: IMG_2646.jpg picture by B_NR - Photobucket Oh goodness. That's not what I was picturing at all. I guess I need to go back to school to learn read better! Cedar shake siding, you can just start ripping on it with a pitchfork. (a roofing pitchfork... not a hay pitchfork! LOL) I'd lay a tarp on the ground then ram the forks under the laps and pry out with the handle. Some will break and splinter off the nails, others will pull right off. Don't get any nails in ur tires! Hello XSleeper: Thanks for the suggestion. But a roof pitchfork maybe a bit more agressive then I prefer. Since I am one of thoes Saturday repair man, my approach was to replace a few at a time. Easier for me to digest then doing an entire wall. Besides that the replacement siding are here and there. So that is why I would prefer to get into a few panels and remove it carefully so I can slip the new one in place. I guess I just have to slightly pry the piece up and get to the nail. I read somewhere that the prefered method was using a hacksaw blade or as Chandler suggested using a reciprocating saw and cut the nails. I saw on youtube a video where a guy was using a Slater ripper. It was for the roof panel but on another website they suggested using the same tool for wood siding. The Slater tool look a bit agressive and I was wondering if that could be applied to wood siding. I just not sure how destructive the tool is when removing the nails. As to replacement siding do you think I could use the same type they use for roofs? I believe the roof siding is made of wood and it looks similar. Thanks for input. James Hardie company makes HardieShingle Siding that is very similar in appearance to what you presently have. The plus side is this product does not absorb water, is dimensionally very stable, and, as a result of the last, does not required repainting nearly as often as wood. Usually, these products are special order through your local home center or big box store. Thanks tldoug. That is another option. I have to see how much siding I need to repalce and weigh (cost-wise) the options (wood vs. hardie). Though the hardie looks a bit heavy. Any idea what the cost of the hardie siding? Besides hardie anyone know what other alternatives there are to use as a cedar siding (must closely match existing at least in dimensions)? I am going to paint the siding so is there a none-cedar replacement (besides hardie) available? Seems to be a bit excessive to use cedar if it is painted. Thank you There's always vinyl siding and you can get cedar color tones. Hardiplank is quite expensive compared to vinyl. Certain teed has a line of products you may like as well. Oops, missed the dimensions comment. Vinyl only do-able if you doing an entire wall.
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