Help me figure out how to do Vinyl Siding !

[airbiscuit]

A few years back, my son bought a home with an unfinished 3 season room. The build quality is mediocre, but we want to finish off the exterior with matching vinyl siding. I have decent carpentry skills, but I have never done vinyl siding. I know we have to put a Tyvek type house wrap on first.

I need to know the types and nomenclature for trim

• At the bottom
• At the top
• At the outside and inside corners
• Around the windows and door

Is the starter row just siding, or something different?
How do I deal with that ledge (about 1 1/2") partway up?
Any other advice?

 

[CalG]

I'm in a similar situation.
My Daughter's house needs an exterior wall rebuilt, and I haven't a clue about vinyl siding.

My motto has always been

"Vinyl siding is hiding"!

 

[RustyA]

Why is the ledge there? I would remove bottom course of OSB and ledge to start with a flat surface. Looks like gable end under eave has some sort of siding up high in picture #1? J trim around window and under soffit. Bottom starter strip first row of siding snaps into and strip disappears. Handrail for step hits right where your corner trim will go.. that will be challenging if you leave it attached to house.

 

[Racer4]

Bottom—-starter strip

Around doors, windows, and at top—-J channel

Inside and outside corners—- inside and outside corners

I would cut that lower lip off flush with the plywood and pad out the frame to make it even with the plywood. You want everything as flat as can be.

As far as your inside corners go, you will have to cut the old siding loose to get the inside corner trim behind the old siding. Or you could caulk any openings created by framing over the old siding and just stick another J channel up against the old siding.

 

[KennyG]

Vinyl siding is pretty simple and is the best value for exterior finish. I have seem poor installations and it amazes me because you don't have to be very skilled to do it correctly. Either remove the ledge or shim out to it. A perfectly flat and square surface will result in a perfect finished installation. The most common mistakes are not using the correct trim pieces and over driving the nails so the siding can't expand. Detailed instructions are readily available. Take a look at this:

https://polymericexteriors.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/2020-VSI-Installation-Manual.pdf

 

[2manyrocks]

The "ledge" is a piece of aluminum flashing installed between the upper and lower sheets of OSB to keep water from running between them.

Looks like the walls were built on top of an existing exterior deck, but they left the decking extending beyond the wall. Water will run down and hit the deck running back into the structure. This needs to be cut flush, and I'd probably flash it to create a drip edge for the water to run off below the wall.

Basically, this entire thing needs to be gone over thoroughly to make sure there isn't any rot or deterioration and then you need to correct all water penetration issues with flashing before you cover it with tyvek and vinyl siding.

 

[ZTMAN]

Based on the pics, that is a deck that someone enclosed.

You say it is a three season room, but I see deck boards in the pic. Did the prior owner put flooring over the deck boards?

Before you get a lot of money tied up, you may want to confirm that deck framing is suitable to support the extra weight of the materials that were added.

 

[airbiscuit]

Ya, it was a sketchy build. It is what it is. Trying to put lipstick on a pig.

 

[2manyrocks]

Just don't trap water inside the structure or install vinyl over any OSB that has any soft spots. The nails won't hold and it'll be more work to repair later. The picture makes it appear that the OSB may be failing where it comes in contact with the deck. This is where you'd have to install a starter strip to begin to run all of your vinyl, and it needs to be solid.

The odd thing is that they installed these OSB sheets horizontally instead of vertically which then caused them to install the aluminum flashing (ledge) between the sheets. If you need to re-sheet this, I suggest installing the OSB vertically.

Doesn't look like they applied any flashing to the windows. The ones on the gable end look the most exposed to the weather. You may want to pull those off, install flashing, and then reinstall them so water doesn't penetrate.

 

[dodge man]

I’ve only done it once several years ago on a small shed. It was pretty easy.

 

[Williy]

IMHO vinyl siding isn't worth the money, it fades, cracks,
mold, bugs etc.

Engineered wood siding is a lot more durable will last
longer will not rot and termites don't like it and it comes
in 4x8 sheets so will install faster less work
Had vinyl siding on my dad's house looked terrible hada
whitish hue to it.

willy

 

[KennyG]

IMHO vinyl siding isn't worth the money, it fades, cracks,
mold, bugs etc.

Engineered wood siding is a lot more durable will last
longer will not rot and termites don't like it and it comes
in 4x8 sheets so will install faster less work
Had vinyl siding on my dad's house looked terrible hada
whitish hue to it.

willy

Maybe the sun is particularly hard on vinyl in Texas but up here we figure on at least a 50 year life span on good siding. I know you can find claims on line that the life is only 20 to 40 years, but around here we consider it semi-permanent.

 

[MossRoad]

Maybe the sun is particularly hard on vinyl in Texas but up here we figure on at least a 50 year life span on good siding. I know you can find claims on line that the life is only 20 to 40 years, but around here we consider it semi-permanent.

Same here. Had ours done in 89. Still looks fine.

 

[lostcause]

My motto has always been

"Vinyl siding is hiding"!

Around here the saying is: "vinyl is final".

It is ideally the easiest, cheapest, and most maintenance free siding option out there for the homeowner. Given all the money in the world, along with time to re-coat every few years, I prefer the appearance of a semi-transparent stained wood clapboard, but that's not always in the cards.

It looks like the house originally had a decent job on the vinyl, but whoever did the 3 season room did it no justice. If it were me, I'd strip the room down and rebuild from the deck up so that ll the walls are in a single plane. It looks like the gable end of the porch already has vinyl, so you want that wall to have the sheathing to be flush with the sheathing under the siding. Sure, it's slightly forgiving and will hide some stuff, but you can only polish it so much...

There's also a couple schools of thought on vinyl installation. I've seen people who just cut & silicone all the gaps, but you can actually install it so that you don't need to goop it all together to seal it. google & you tube it and I'm sure you can find everything you need. I just finished vinyl on my new 16x26 shed and i think it came out really good. Going to contemplate replacing the 30+ year old vinyl on my house & garage next so they all match.

 

[yomax4]

You can take your dimensions to a big box store or where ever you plan to get the siding. They can give you a print out of everything you need. You can then sort out the terminology of all the components. They will help you get an idea how to get started and some cheap siding tools that really help.

 

[Williy]

My dad's house was in Wisconsin and the color was a light
blue when it was first put on.

willy

 

[MoArk Willy]

This should help.....it helped me.

https://polymericexteriors.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/2018-Vinyl-Siding-Installation-Manual-.pdf

 

[airbiscuit]

That was just excellent! Thank you.

 

[Rockbadchild]

There's good video's on youtube for the how too... siding has a high expansion and retractions proprety so each piece should be able to slide left to right by pulling or pushing on it, so all nails need to be loose to snug (don't pound your nails tight), (thats for the siding it doesn't apply for the trims) starter strip to start, J trims around windows, drip edge on top of windows and doors, inside corner for inside corner and corner for corners... stagger your joints, keep your cuts hidden inside the corners and don't put joints directly above or below windows or doors... I would add sheet of wood above that ledge to hide it and make it flush.

Keep in mind the temperture when you are doing it, if its relatively hot you want to install it with less gape in the joints and at the ends because when its cold it will retract and if too loose you will see gaps, if its cold you want to leave more of a gap because it will expand and buckle once it warm up of not enough of a gap. If its too cold it's hard the siding gets brittle and will break while you are trying to cut it.

For cutting I used a grinder with a thin cut off disk or tin snips for vertical cuts and a utility retractable knife for longitudinal cuts, and I just do a score and you simply fold it. There is also all kinds of way to make the corners for the perimeter around the windows with the J trims, cuts at 45 degrees, squares, my preferred method is one square and the other one cut at 45, it's easier then both at 45 and loots better then squares. There are pliers to make the J trims

but again check on youtube for siding video.