If you have more than several days per year of freezing temperatures and especially if you often times have snow pack sit against your siding, the below article is for you! We work in the South Lake Tahoe area often, and we have first hand experience and knowledge of how hard snow and freezing temperatures can be on building materials. Our family comes from Spokane, Washington so we also have first hand knowledge of the types of materials that last long term in these conditions. The below information from LP SmartSide is a great place to start. Here are a few notes from our experience working in these conditions:
- If you own a cabin or vacation home that is not lived in year round, you will not likely be able to keep the snow pack off of your house, so choosing the right building materials for your snow pack areas is very important!
- We typically recommend installing a wainscoting around the bottom portion of the siding. This typically means a few feet on the front of the house, but maybe 4-6′ on the two sides (or where the snow slides of the gable roof and sits against your siding). This allows you to choose a different cladding for the snow pack area and should be a focus of your maintenance over the coming years. Then, choose a siding that does not crack easily in the freeze/thaw and even check with the manufacturers warranty to see if your warranty will remain in tact with snow pack conditions. Some of our favorites are:
- LP SmartSide – If we are installing lap siding on the house, we would install a vertical or Board & Batten style in the bottom portion to break it up. We would recommend that homeowners paint the lower portion more often than the rest of the house.
- Stone – Although this can be an expensive option, this is a durable solution in this area.
- Standing Seam Steel or Aluminum – Using the same material that is on their roof now, or similar is a great way to tie the house together and add to its durability.
PROTECTING SIDING FROM FREEZE/THAW CYCLE DAMAGE
Learn how different siding types respond to repeated freezing and thawing.
When cold weather hits, the continuous cycle of freezing and thawing puts great stress on any built surface. It’s what causes potholes on our highways—and it can cause significant damage to a home’s siding. The freeze/thaw cycle occurs because water expands by nearly 10% as it freezes. If water gets trapped in a siding material like fiber cement and the temperature falls below 32° F, it creates extreme pressure on the material as it expands.
Some U.S. cities—like Tucson, Arizona and Jacksonville, Florida—have just a few days of freeze/thaw cycles per year. Other cities aren’t so lucky. The Denver area has more than 105 days of freeze/thaw annually, while cities in northern Michigan often get 102. Baltimore logs about 83 days and Kansas City has 79 days each year. When the freeze/thaw cycle happens repeatedly, year after year, the cumulative effect can cause cracking and serious structural damage to siding material.
To help home builders across the U.S. figure out the best siding option for both them and their customers, here’s a look at how today’s most popular siding choices compare when it comes to combating freeze/thaw damage:
Fiber cement – Since fiber cement is essentially concrete, it’s naturally more brittle than engineered wood siding and other material. That makes it more susceptible to cracking or breaking when water penetrates the substrate and expands as temperatures fall. There’s a lot of talk these days about “smart concrete” that can resist freeze/thaw damage, but that technology is still in the testing stage.
Vinyl siding – Vinyl contracts and expands significantly as the temperature changes. That’s why it must be loosely installed on a house to allow for movement. Like fiber cement, vinyl siding is more likely to crack in the winter.
Traditional wood siding – It takes high level of maintenance to protect traditional wood siding from freeze/thaw damage. Without routine maintenance like painting and scraping, wood will easily warp, crack and split.
Engineered wood siding – This material is specially designed to resist cracking and splitting. Because products like LP SmartSide engineered wood trim and siding are made from a combination of treated wood fiber and industrial-grade binders and resins, they’re better able to withstand damage from freeze/thaw cycles.
Freeze/thaw cycles will continue to produce potholes on our roads, but engineering breakthroughs can help prevent them from damaging a home’s siding.
LP SmartSide is a registered trademark of Louisiana-Pacific Corporation.
