Cedar weatherboards

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dusty42

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#195092 6-Apr-2016 10:17

Does anyone here have any experiences and advice with owning cedar weatherboards?

There are a ton of products out there, I'm wondering what you use, and how you chose it.

My 50 year old place is coated with Bunnings-grade decking oil, and is desperately in need of more. I love the look of the CD50 treated buildings I have seen, but I'm not sure how easy it is to change from one system to another, let alone change colour. I have mid-poo-brown atm, but those more natural looking cedar finishes look fantastic to me

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#1526766 6-Apr-2016 10:29

Cedar is finnicky stuff because of the natural oils in it (which make it a great option for external cladding without needing paint).

I helped out a mate using Resene Woodsman stain a couple of years back. Made a nice job of it, but things to watch out for:

- you need to keep stirring the stain, as the tint is heavier than the oil and so tends to settle. If you don't stir, the stain will get darker the further down the bucket

- stain doesn't last nearly as long as paint, but the prep is much quicker and easier. So you stain more often, but it's quicker than painting

- Resene has "waterborne" oil stain (unhelpfully also called Woodsman). This is apparently an oil stain suspended in water (or something) - basically you can clean up in water. But the existing stain on my mate's house was new enough that Resene recommended we didn't use the waterborne one over the top of an oil stain. The Resene technical helpline is usually really good though (0800 RESENE (737 363))

livealittle

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#1526804 6-Apr-2016 10:53

he have 2.5hr old house with ceder on it. Ceder and stain came from Herman Pacific. The team in Chch were great to deal with.

They have a huge selection of stains (colour wise) and it's easy to recoat.

Go talk to them for advice

Disrespective

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#1526974 6-Apr-2016 13:31

Call someone like Rosenfeld Kidson or JSC Timber and ask a merchant directly what they would recommend. They should be happy to help.

We typically specify a Drydens oil for new build cedar, but have just started to look at more environmentally friendly options such as Woca oil (vegetable based). I suspect either of those may work fine.

Does the house have a tint in the oil/stain already? Or have the boards silvered and only require a natural finish?

andrew027

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#1526986 6-Apr-2016 13:58

My house has different types of cladding in various places but about a third of it is cedar. The building inspection I had done before purchase said the whole place needed repainting, particularly the cement board sections as the paint coating is critical to the water tightness of the cladding. The cedar surfaces were quite variable in finish as some (particularly those facing north) had weathered badly and were almost down to bare board, whereas those on the south side or in shade looked like they had been stained very recently.

I arranged for professional painters to do the whole house/all surfaces after I moved in. They used a Resene stain for the cedar - I can't remember if it was Woodsman or not but I have half a bucket left in the garage so I can check. The issue was that I wanted the cedar board surfaces darker than they had been previously but you have to be much more careful about colour choices as even when going darker the old colour can show through quite a bit. Thus wasn't a problem for the badly weathered sections but would have left some areas of the house with a red colour showing through that I didn't want. So pick your colours carefully as it's not that easy to change them later.

As @mdf said, stained cedar needs more frequent attention, but it's much quicker and easier to do than painting. Looking at how the cedar had weathered I figure I can do about three quarters of the house myself every three years, and the more sheltered areas might last six years, so I'll do it every other time. Then I'll get the professionals in for the cement board surfaces every ten years, as they need special attention and many of them are on sections where two or three storeys of scaffolding are required.

mattwnz

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#1527023 6-Apr-2016 14:34

You can just let it go natural, our house had unstained cedar for 30 plus years, with no major deterioration. But it has just been stained to clean it up the appearance, as you get water marks and uneven colours leaving it natural, and now they look as good as new. It was stained with a resene stain, not sure if it was the waterbased one or the oil one. But once stained you probably have to restain it even 5 or so years. You can also get grey stains that makes it look weathered, which look quite nice. It all depends on the look you are going for. It is one of my favourite timbers. You can also check out JSC timber, which has a lot of info. They can prestain cedar weather boards, and have some other products they use as well as resene ones. My brothers new house has just had some ship-lapped cedar weather boards installed which were prestained. I think that if you are painting it, rather than staining, you are probably better to go for another cheaper timber, as cedar is pricey. I also like macrocarpa, but it is a more rustic look, a bit more knoty and can split over time,it is a bit of the poor mans cedar.

MikeAqua

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#1527596 7-Apr-2016 12:42

Let it go natural (silvery grey) then try a new stain.

Cedar can be difficult to paint as it bleeds oil, which can blister paint.

Mike

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#1527641 7-Apr-2016 13:46

Surface preparation:

Whatever you do - DO NOT WATERBLAST cedar before you stain it - you will ruin the wood, and make painting much harder.

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rphenix

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#1527645 7-Apr-2016 13:53

MikeAqua:

Let it go natural (silvery grey) then try a new stain.

Cedar can be difficult to paint as it bleeds oil, which can blister paint.

Explains why our house has a few blisters when we purchased it - just put it down to cheap paint job before they flicked it on. So if you want to touch up painted cedar is there anything that should be done differently to weatherboard?

Disrespective

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#1527752 7-Apr-2016 16:03

mattwnz:

You can just let it go natural,

This is not the best advice. You need to be very careful of cedar in our environment. In Europe the cedar used is very clear and free of knots and can stand up to exposure and consequent silvering much better. Here in NZ our cedar can be quite knotty which when combined with our harsh sun and often coastal environments can cause these knotts to pop out and create holes in your cladding. The knotts don't even need to pop out completely to have serious consequences to the weatherproofing of the building. An oil or paint system is definitely recommended for any cedar cladding in NZ. YMMV

mdf

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#1527777 7-Apr-2016 16:50

rphenix:

MikeAqua:

Let it go natural (silvery grey) then try a new stain.

Cedar can be difficult to paint as it bleeds oil, which can blister paint.

Explains why our house has a few blisters when we purchased it - just put it down to cheap paint job before they flicked it on. So if you want to touch up painted cedar is there anything that should be done differently to weatherboard?

Touching up _painted_ cedar = oil based wood primer on any bare timber (note that some native timbers (pre 1930s?) really don't like oil based wood primers so careful what you put it on. You can then overcoat with a water based undercoat and topcoat. If the wood isn't in great nick, consider a coat of Timberlock or equivalent first.

Touching up stained anything = damn nigh impossible without awful lap marks.

mattwnz

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#1527789 7-Apr-2016 17:21

Disrespective:

mattwnz:

You can just let it go natural,
This is not the best advice. You need to be very careful of cedar in our environment. In Europe the cedar used is very clear and free of knots and can stand up to exposure and consequent silvering much better. Here in NZ our cedar can be quite knotty which when combined with our harsh sun and often coastal environments can cause these knotts to pop out and create holes in your cladding. The knotts don't even need to pop out completely to have serious consequences to the weatherproofing of the building. An oil or paint system is definitely recommended for any cedar cladding in NZ. YMMV

I have never seen 'knotty' cedar being sold, as it is all imported as far as I am aware. If you are getting knotty cedar, it will be seconds, or it may not be the quality western red imported stuff. New cedar for cladding should be sold in 'clears' , and shouldn't have ANY knots in it. We have had cedar weather board unstained for decades,(no knots) as it has natural protectants in it, and looks as good as new now it has been stained. Staining doesn't really provide much extra protection, becuase if there is a knot and gap, water will still get in eventually. Painting and fiiling the holes is the only way to stop that. You maybe referring to macrocarpa, which can be knotty. Usually it is installed on a cavity with wrap behind that anyway these days. The thing is most claddings can leak to some extent anyway, that is why there has to be ways for the water to drain out. It is becuase water couldn't get out , that was a contributing factor of the whole the leaky building thing, which is why most cladding now requires a cavity to allow water to get out from behind the cladding. Anyway, the local TA will tell you what is and isn't allowed anyway when it comes to cladding.

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mattwnz

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#1527790 7-Apr-2016 17:23

MikeAqua:

Let it go natural (silvery grey) then try a new stain.

Cedar can be difficult to paint as it bleeds oil, which can blister paint.

Our 50's house was actually originally clad in cedar and painted (probably lead based), and I don't recall it having a major problem with blistering.

mdf

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#1527791 7-Apr-2016 17:26

mattwnz:
MikeAqua:

Let it go natural (silvery grey) then try a new stain.

Cedar can be difficult to paint as it bleeds oil, which can blister paint.

Our 50's house was actually originally clad in cedar and painted (probably lead based), and I don't recall it having a major problem with blistering.

If it was lead based paint, it would have been over oil primer which is fine. Cedar oils and water based primers can sometimes cause trouble.

mattwnz

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#1527793 7-Apr-2016 17:30

mdf:
mattwnz:

MikeAqua:

Let it go natural (silvery grey) then try a new stain.

Cedar can be difficult to paint as it bleeds oil, which can blister paint.

Our 50's house was actually originally clad in cedar and painted (probably lead based), and I don't recall it having a major problem with blistering.

If it was lead based paint, it would have been over oil primer which is fine. Cedar oils and water based primers can sometimes cause trouble.

That is probably what it was, that old paint was very durable and hardwearing too.

dusty42

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#1527823 7-Apr-2016 17:50

Interesting responses all - thanks.

The house is 50 years old and has rough sawn cedar - stained with a Cabots deck oil by the previous owner.I was just wondering if anyone here had tried to go from oil->stain or stain->oil

Interesting experience Andrew027 on the freqency of cedar staining your place.

I can see some cupping and lifting on the face of the house which catches morning light - so the timber is overdue for another coating.

I had expected to eventually get a water blaster to use on the house - yeah cedar is soft as warm cheese, but all the cleaning systems say to use pressure washers to remove, just really really carefully I guess.

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