I had pictured picking up some nice shets of slightly rough 3/8 inch material to finish my soffits. But when I got to the store I found these sheets of plywood with football cutouts. Is this what I should expect? Do the cutouts cover well with paint? Ideas?
Thanks,
Steve
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I can say from experience that paint doesn't cover the footballs. Initially, I put the stuff you're talking about on my own house and it turned out .....disappointing.
I went back w/T&G red cedar, but if you want a sheet material, you might look at the fibercement materials or a higher grade of the roughened plywood. I sided a house once at the owners request with a T-111 type but without the dadoes. The face was luaun or some kind of tropical veneer on doug fir ply. A prime grade and about $45 a sheet for 5/8" but I believe it was available in 3/8"
Thanks for the feedback and suggestions. I was hoping to use sheets to avoid the extra framing. $45 a sheet isn't cheap but maybe for the front of the house it might not be a bad idea.
Steve
Are these cutouts missing? Usually they are patches glued into the cutouts and they hide under a couple good coats of paint quite well. If you wanted them to entirely disappear instead of just hiding, then you could slide some bondo over them and sand before painting.
They are patches. It appears they replace the knots that were cut out. That was my concern, how many coats of paint and if indeed you can't see them. There are quite a few on each sheet, seems like a lot of repair for something you plan to use as a finish.
see if the same sheets can be ordered in birch or oak........finish grade ply shouldn't have the footballs. Jeff She's exotic ,but not foreign, like an old Cadillac......she's a knockout!
Good suggestion Jeff. Sounds like he picked uo B/C grade plywood. he could move up to A/C grade and have one good side. another alternative is to go to MDO for a true paintable finish. The only blemish you get with MDO is from the painter. Figure about $35 a sheet for 3/8 one side MDO.
Dave
y spend the rest of your life painting soffits ? we went to vinyl soffits about 15 years ago and never looked back.....Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
What kind of framing do you need with vinyl and who is most likely to carry it?
Is MDO as stiff as plywood? Will I need extra framing?
Steve, MDO is medium density overlay. It is plywood with bonded overlay of something like hardboard (someone help me out here..., what is the overlay made of?). The framing is the same as for a plywood soffit. MDO is available from 1/4 inch to one inch tickness and overlayed on one or both sides. One side 3/8 would work for what you are doing. I paid $49.00 for 3/4 inch one side MDO fir in Jan. of this year. I built a painted window seat with it, and even though I brushed the paint, it was as smooth as a baby's bottom.
For a soffit panel I have to agree with Mike. Vinyl is almost maintenance free. Unless you go over 24 inches the framing is less complicated than for aplywood soffit panel.
If you use plywood or MDO, be sure to prime it before you put it up. That includes the back and edges. This will give your topcoat of paint a longer life than the 3 to 5 years you get from a face only paint job.
Dave
for a 16" soffit, say two pieces of furring,
here's Alcoa Pro-bead used in the soffits, up the rakes and in the entry ceiling..
Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Mike,
Thanks for the pic. That is similar to my situation. I have a gable over the porch that meets two hips at either end. My rafters extend two feet so the horizontal is a bit less but more than 16".
One problem I am trying to figure out is the bottom of the beam across the porch is higher than the rafter ends so I need to build it up somehow.
Do you have more pics? You've given me some ideas already. If you want you can email them directly to me.
[email protected]
Thanks,Steve
I don't know if this would help your beam situation or not, it helped mine...
sorry, this may be better
Billy,
That's interesting, is the space between the boards enough for venting?
Steve
Steve, it works fine here in NC. The spacing could be wider, or there could be more spaces...it might not look good on all houses, but, like I said, I don't think the luminum stuff looks good on any houses...
here's one we painted ... the upper cornice is Pro-bead vinyl...the lower is fir bead board... both gutters are aluminum..Mike Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
Mike,
How does this material come? It looks like you have it running length wise for one direction and cut along the width for the perpendicular soffits to match.
Steve
It used to be that two sided MDO was nicknamed 'Signboard' because it stood the elements well enough for that purpose and the cost was a little prohibitive for many pocketbooks.
The finish surface is paper. Just like Formica which is about twenty or thirty layers of paper bonded together with resins and pressure. The MDO is not so many layers and no hardtop finish. I've got a sheet in the yard that has been kicking around for three years as a temporary table on sites in all kinds of weather. It's good stuff.
But a little overkill for soffits, IMHO. But then most of my soffits are two or three stories in the air and you have to be about three or four feet away to be able to pick out the football patches after painting. I use AC but it sounds like yuou might have BC since you have so many.
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Another alternative is 1 x lineals. I've never cared much for the ply and aluminum vent, so we staple screen to the rafter tails. On an 18" overhang, we would then up nail 3 1x6's with about a 1/4" gap between...
I agree, MDO is way to expensive. The only time we ever used it was on an office building for a Arabian horse farm. That is what was specified, along with a lot of other high price stuff.
I wanted to say the finish was paper, but that sounded to simple. Thanks for the correct describtion.
Dave
Sounds like I need to check a lumber or specialty store. With all the construction going on in this area you would think this would be a stock item.
Steve,
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steve,
just pick up some 3/8 cedar ply that or beaded ply running perpendicular to your wall looks great also