Anybody got a good trick, tool or jig for installing long clapboards by yourself?
I can’t figure out how to hold one end of the siding up while I’m fastening the other side.
TF
Toolfanatic (a.k.a. The man formerly known as “Toolfreak”)
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Set a small nail on the clap below the one you're about to install. Set it just high of the bottom of the clap you're installing's final resting place so that when your done it's hole will be covered by the clap you're working. Rest the far end on the nail, nail home the other end, and pull the 'hanger' nail out as you work your way down the clap.
There are several siding jigs that set a constant exposure from course to the next, and also double as a second set of hands when you're working alone. Check out the Malco sfacing gauge: http://malco.malcoproducts.com/products/siding-fiber/fcfg.asp, or the Labor Saver, http://www.thelaborsaver.com. I just heard of a new one as well: http://www.solosider.com
Justin Fink - FHB Editorial
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I recently saw Tom Silva on "Ask This Old House" with a mystery tool. It was a vacuum actuated siding gauge. Works like the vacuum seal on a concrete core drill but is designed to be stuck on the underlying clap. It can be set for a specific exposure and it also serves as a rest for one end of the clap, while the other is nailed off. Designed exactly for one-man siding jobs. To be honest, it seems like a complicated, cumbersome, and probably expensive jig, that would probably fail on anything but the smooth side of preprimed siding. Probably designed with the DIY/HO type in mind, but it does little more more than a simple siding nail tacked in at one end of the underlying clap as described earlier, but since you are the "toolfanatic" I thought you should know about these.
I have read on other forums that this tool is great for installing crown molding by yourself. You could probably use it on wallpaper without marking it.
John
Take a few minutes and make a few of these, they'll save time.
Good Luck.
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