Replies

1. 
   davidmeiland | Jul 17, 2005 09:08am | #1

   Can I persuade you to find an old-house restoration expert in your area and hire them as a consultant? It would be a shame to have guys pawing around your old house that don't know what the hail they're doing!

2. 
   blue_eyed_devil | Jul 17, 2005 04:13pm | #2

   I think you pretty well proved that Tyvek isn't necessary.

   blue

    

1. 
   davidmeiland | Jul 17, 2005 06:14pm | #3

   You mean because the house is 280 years old and has never had it? But... would you insulate a wall without a vapor or moisture barrier to protect it? An uninsulated wall with the wind blowing thru it is a totally different thing. Add insulation and you lose the air circulation that dries it out.

2. 
   Woodbutcher | Jul 17, 2005 06:16pm | #4

   I agree about finding a renovation expert.  

   Something else to consider-  If you are going to just replace clapboards as needed here and there, the quality of wood that is available today is nowhere near that of what they were using back then.   Just because those boards lasted some 200+ years,   you'll be lucky if what you put on now will last 5 years before it starts to rot.

3. 
   rez | Jul 17, 2005 07:49pm | #5

   bump

    

    

   A person with no sense of humor about themselves is fullashid
   
   

    

4. 
   andybuildz | Jul 17, 2005 08:38pm | #6

   Art
   Reckon the Razzman bumped me in here...lol.
   I have circa:1680 house I bought almost three years ago and I've been working on it for what seems like decades.
   BEfore I got thiis place someone obviously blew cellulose in the walls (thank god). I think they did it from the inside. Its a lot easier that way even though its plaster walls. Thing is its a mess so the house or rooms should be empty at the time of the dust storm.

   Tyvek from what I've learned shouldn't be put under cedar/ It apparently breaks down the Tyvek eventually.
   There "were" clapboards under some areas of shake thats now on the house.
   The clapboards are what I know as "Dutchlap"...has the cove on bottom sort of and snooth above that on each board.

   If you opt to go from the outside theres a tool I'm sure someone can post for you here that slides under the siding and breaks the nail holding it down. Thats the route you'd have to go.
   The strip boards as you call it are called skip[ sheathing. the ones on my house were a full 1" thick or even thicker. The traditional siding in the original day on this house was in fact shakes as has been used on other houses in my area as well as the Historic Societies museum near here I worked on.
   Check to see if the clapboards were added later on...my guess is maybe.
   Not too much exterior stuff stays after all those years but who knows.

   My house was timber framed with Oak which was native to my area (try and put a nail in that now...whewww).
   Anything else I can help you with just ask
   Be well
   a...

   The secret of Zen in two words is, "Not always so"!

   When we meet, we say, Namaste'..it means..

     I honor the place in you where the entire universe resides,

   I honor the place in you of love, of light, of truth, of peace.

   I honor the place within you where if you are in that place in you

   and I am in that place in me, there is only one of us.

    

    

   
    

    

5. 
   mccarty12 | Jul 18, 2005 01:42am | #7

   I ripped off the asbestos siding on my 1903 house which had cedar behind it. I followed the exact prep recomended by the Forest products lab. I powerwashed then scaped and sanded. I primed immediately and put a top coat on right after that. Even with that painstaking prep I still had a little paint failure after a year.. I scraped and primed and painted the weak areas which seem to be fine now.

   I wouldn't Tyvek if you plan on saving the siding. I think you will find the siding brittle and will ruin alot of it. Plus it takes a long time to install a small reveal siding.

   But it was worth it to me. My house is the green one. My house used to look like the one next door.

6. 
   C1802362 | Jul 18, 2005 02:49am | #8

   Thanks for all the input - the restoration expert is definitely the track I'm going to take

   by the way the houses look fantastic

1. 
   rez | Jul 18, 2005 03:54am | #9

   Depends on the siding clapboards you have on there.

   I've removed old redwood and cedar 1x10 clapboards off of timberframes put on with square nails that just popped off easily.

   If it's narrower pine it'll probably split all over.

    

    

   A person with no sense of humor about themselves is fullashid 

7. 
   igrant | Jul 18, 2005 04:08am | #10

   I have a 1908 house, with oak sheathing, the original siding and stucco on top. In my case, the woood never gets chance to get wet - or dry when it has a leak internally. Someone told me Tyveck is a bit like stucco when it comes to letting air circulate. (My house was stucco'd sometime in the 1920's, we think).

   A neighbor put a lot of work into his insulation, and now has a house that basically rots. No air getting through the sheathing. Be careful! (And good luck with the project).

   Ian

8. 
   csnow | Jul 18, 2005 11:53pm | #11

   Possible, but;

   Odds are that the siding underneath will have like 50 coats of lead paint, and will not take another one well.  That's why they put up the vinyl.  As romantic as it may sound to save the 'nice old growth' stuff or whatever, the reality is that the labor for stripping it may be overwhelming when compared to replacement.  Perhaps if there is something unique about the wood siding then it would be worth it, but for standard stuff it would be hard to justify.  Even though the house is 268 years old, you are likely to find that the siding is much newer.  Now if the siding was really 268 years old, it would be handcut, and it would be worth restoring if possible.

   Also, removing the siding gives you a chance to repair any rot, and flash everything properly.  Lead flashing (for example) is very durable stuff, but it does fail over the centuries.  Often vinyl installers will do a real hachet job on anything that gets in their way, and you may find water damage.  I have seen them literally hatchet off windowsills, water tables, and such to get a smooth plane to work with.

   In terms of removal and reattach, the old boards tend to be very brittle, so it can be tricky to impossible to get them off whole.

   If you want to blow cells, that really tilts the scale toward replacement.  Easy to blow with the siding off.

   If you have historically interesting trim or decoration, that would probably be the place to invest in stripping and restoration work.

   In terms of wrap, data suggests that feltpaper outperforms Tyvek without the cedar contact issues, though if you were to use a rainscreen design you would come out way ahead regardless of wrap used.

9. 
   GCourter | Jul 19, 2005 03:20am | #12

   One of the big problems that you are going to have with insulating a wood sided house that has never had insulation is that the old board are not back primed.  When you blow in insulation and paint the exterior the paint will keep peeling off.  I have three "new" old houses (100-150) in my block that were insulated but not back primed and they have all had paint adhesion problems.  The worst one is the bed and breakfast that they gutted and did not back prime before insulating, the funny part is, the new boards they installed got back primed but on the old exisiting boards.  I too recommend that you find a very good restoration specialist, not on the contractors payroll and hire him.

10. 
    RenaissanceRestorations | Jul 19, 2005 11:11pm | #13

    In all of the restorations I've done on older homes, I've removed all the old siding, repaired any damaged sheathing, layer of Tyvek, with flashing around the windows, and pre-primed cedar siding, which is primed again on the outside prior to painting. I also agree that old siding that isn't primed on one side will cause paint to fail, no matter how many times you paint it.

    JoeF

    Renaissance Restorations
    Antique & Victorian Home Restoration Services
    http://www.renaissancerestorations.com

11. 
    JohnT8 | Jul 20, 2005 12:59am | #14

    Art, have you stripped off a test area?  It is always a BIG assumption to assume what you're going to find under vinyl.

    In 200 years, the house could have had 2 or 3 different types of siding.  You might pull the vinyl and find asbestos siding underneath... or maybe you find wood clapboard, but maybe its from 1900.  Or maybe find aluminum (unlikely).

    Those old houses are always a big mystery.  Depending on your area, you might have a foam contractor that can insulate your walls.  The expanding foam wouldn't require tyvek.

    Good luck!

     

    jt8

    The reason so many people never get anywhere in life is because when opportunity knocks, they are out in the backyard looking for four-leaf clovers.
    -- Walter Percy Chrysler

1. 
   C1802362 | Jul 20, 2005 05:49am | #15

   thanks - good suggestion