Three vinyl siding questions from a newbie

As far as vinyl siding goes you have to research the thicknesses of the material. Certainteed makes very good vinyl siding. There are a bunch of circumstances that could cause vinyl siding to break or shatter with a weed wacker such as cold temps. But if you want to put something around the base of the house that will withstand the weed wacker I would recommend a PVC band board with a metal drip cap. If you wrap any sort of wood with aluminum coil stock it is going to just get messec up.

tomstruble said:

more would be siding guys...

here's a little advise... try reading the instructions that are usually printed right on the box,or better yet ask your siding supplier for an install manual [not sure if lowes or hd have them tho] and you will be light years ahead of 50% of your competition

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sad but very true.if you understand the product and how its applied your success will be that much greater.

It wouldn't take long for the weedeater to damage a PVC trimboard, so I don't recommend that. Maybe a Hardie cementitious product would fit the bill better.
If a weedeater is damaging the siding, there may be bigger issues. Either the grade could be to high or the elevation of the foundation too low, but siding that close too the ground sounds like a problem. Our rule of thumb is 8" from grade to bottom of siding, which should cover the foundation by about 1" to prevent problems with water infiltration.

We've been using Certainteed brand siding for years with fabilous results and no all backs, it is much more forgivable in the colder months that any of that ABTICO/Timbercrest junk home owners want to compare your siding bid with:laughing: We've been getting into some Great Barrier brand and so far it's been very nice to us too and has a nice bold lap profile for added character as well as a salesman touted UV protector that does'nt promote fade near as bad as "typical" platic siding....we have one really dark job we did last summer so i'm going to keep a close eye on it to see how it works out resisting fade.

A composite trim board along the bottom sounds like the order of the day if a weedeater is killing the siding. A composite board will get beat up eventually too, but will weather the beating longer than the plastic siding obviously.

Anothe tip, NEVER, never ever cap the sills/thresholds of entry doors or other area's that see traffic, you will get calls back to replace it every other month because it'll get beat to chit and look terrible. Either tell homies to paint it or replace the face with a composite board.

You can take the best product in the world, and if the installer is a hack it'll be ruined. Or you can give an experienced vet some garbage product and he'll make it look like a million bucks...no different than anything else in life, but i prefer not to us anything below Certainteed because the history has shown the increase in call backs for the cheap crap is 100x's that of what i prefer to use.

BuiltByMAC said:

I'll say this much for the OP, you've got a memorable business name. Some kind of story behind that? Mac

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Not really. I happen to have a huge handlebar, :euro:and my nephews and nieces like to call me uncle moustache. I thought it had a nice ring to it. Much better than "JP Construction" or something boring like that.

tomstruble said:

more would be siding guys...
here's a little advise... try reading the instructions that are usually printed right on the box,or better yet ask your siding supplier for an install manual [not sure if lowes or hd have them tho] and you will be light years ahead of 50% of your competition

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I agree with that. :thumbup: Most of what I learned about everything has been from reading instructions.

randy franks said:

i am a siding installer and asfar as your weed eater prob. i would start my siding about 3in ( for 1x4) up then wrap a 1 X with coil stock i just done this on the last house i sided the home owner was very pleased and the coil is a life time product hope this helped.
randy

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Forgive my ignorance,:blink: but what is 'coil stock?'

unclemoustache said:

OK-OK, I told you I was a newbie. Just remember, there was a point in your life when you didn't know either. :shifty:

The way I figure it, there's no knowledge anyone has that someone else can't learn.

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Yep, we all started somewhere...but before i was selling jobs i made sure i knew WTF i was selling first and foremost. Kinda hard to sell a room addition if i can even name the components of the walls that needed to be built....what would that say about the experience i planned to bring to the table for your project...kinda see where we're coming from here??

unclemoustache,
You,my dear man,have no business selling siding jobs to unsuspecting HO's.:whistling
There's more to it than reading the instructions.:blink:
If you don't even know what coil stock is,your a long way from doing a proper installation.

This is the kind of thing that gives all installers a bad name.

Your question should have been:
How do I go about getting the proper training to install Vinyl siding?:furious: