Painting and Repairing Old Wood Siding—Step-By-Step

Here are the step-by-step procedures as discussed in our Painting and Stripping Old Wood Siding — Overview page.

Remove the old siding. Carefully use a pry bar to remove the siding. Score the calk on the edges as the ends split easily. On our house, we found that a wire cutter was effective in grabbing the nail head and prying the nail out enough so a hammer could then remove it [Photo below].

Add house wrap. If you remove your siding, you have options to add insulation and house wrap which gives you just that much more protection. With wood siding, you should leave an air gap between the siding and the house wrap. For one side of the house, we used Benjamin Obdyke Home-Slicker-plus-Typar-Rainscreen.

For three of our house's sides, we saved the blown-in cellulose insulation. [Fiberglass versus cellulose]. We found that the blown-in cellulose would not fall out if only three boards were removed at one time. Therefore, we attached the house wrap at the top using staples and then stapled it down after three boards were removed.

Now strip the old paint. We have a separate page on what we did.

Next glue any cracks at the ends of the boards. On our boards that had plugs used after insulation was blown in, we removed the plugs and glued them back. For gluing we at first used used polyurethane glue (Gorilla glue) but switched to the more expensive Abatron LiquidWood. Do not use regualr exterior wood glue or a non-epoxy wood filler. These won't hold up.

Patch surface holes with an exterior wood filler. We ended up using an epoxy filler for all holes, large or small because they never failed. You want to use epoxy filler that has the same expansion properties as wood and doesn't shrink when it cures. We used Abatron WoodEpox. It isn't cost effective to use cheaper auto or marine epoxy fillers which can fail because they don't expand the same as wood.

Caulk cracks. We used GE Supreme Paintable Silicone Window & Door Sealant Don't caulk the space between the bottom of the siding boards so that moisture from house can escape.

Sand. Once any glue and filler have dried, use a belt sander with 100 grit sand paper to remove any paint residue and smooth the boards. You want to see fresh wood that will allow the upcoming waterproof coating to sink in.
Tip: Be sure to wear a dust mask, preferably a N110 rated mask.

Nail any loose boards. We removed the old cut nails from 1860 because they no longer gripped well. We replaced them with stainless steel siding nails. Prime exposed nails. If rusted, use the correct rust primer, or better, use a rust converter. Another option is to replace original nails with stainless steel nails.

Use paintable wood preservative. If your siding has been sanded so water is easily absorbed, it is worth applying a coat of paintable wood preservative. We used Wolman's Zinsser Woodlife Classic.  Use an epoxy consolidant instead of the preservative where the wood has decayed. We painted all of our window sills with Abatron LiquidWood even though it is expensive. This provides excellent water protection and paint bonding for these flat surfaces.

Apply one coat of primer. We use Zinsser® Bulls Eye 1-2-3® PLUS Primer primer. However, the Smith and Co's MultiWoodPrime epoxy primer looks worth considering.

Apply two coats of Home Depot's Behr Marquee Exterior. Behr paints have been mentioned as a top paint in various consumer studies for many years. We use Consumer Reports as our guide to paints.

We are now using semigloss paint as it stays cleaner; however, some people do not like the glossy look.

Epoxy fillers and consolidants

Abatron's LiquidWood and WoodEpox
These products restore rotted, severely damaged windows, columns, frames, broken furniture, structural and decorative wood components. They are especially valuable for parts that cannot be replaced because of size, shape or other reasons. The objects restored with these products become fully functional parts often stronger and far more durable than the original.

The consolidants (penetrants). Reinforces, rebuilds, water- and insect-proofs wood by hardening after penetrating. Regenerates rotted windowsills, frames, structural and decorative parts, furniture, boats, columns, floors.

Epoxy fillers are a structural adhesive putty and wood replacement compound. They are a high-strength no-shrink adhesive paste to fill, repair and replace wood and other materials in structures, walls, floors, furniture, sculptures. They are unaffected by water and insects.

Rot Doctor's Penetrating Epoxy and FILL-IT™ Epoxy Filler

Primers

Wolmans WOODLIFE® Classic Clear Wood Preservative

Smith and Co's MultiWoodPrime epoxy primer