Weatherboards

Before we went on our break we prestained our weatherboards and set up racks for them to sit on and dry while we were away, we cut small fillets to sit between the stacked boards.

The first thing we needed to do was establish a datum. From this we can work out where our weatherboards will sit around the entire house so they line up evenly.

Because we wanted all the weatherboards to line up straight we made sure we had the aluminium joinery all set to the same height.

The weatherboards are required to have a 5mm gap between the head flashing of the windows and doors, and the bottom of the above weatherboard. From this 5mm mark we could measure the profile size of 190mm up to the datum.

To get the datum marked round all sides and corners we used a laser level. We took the laser sensor and attached it to a long straight piece of timber (a ceiling runner) and marked the timber at the datum. We set the sensor on the timber to a height in relation the laser level, and from there we could transfer this height all round the house.

We needed to make a story rod. From this story rod we could mark out on the cavity battens the positions the tops of the weatherboards need to sit so the weatherboards are all equal when we position and fix them as we worked up from the bottom of the house.

The way to get the measurements for a story rod is to do a few calculations. First we need to measure down the wall from the datum line to 20mm below the boundary joist.

The calculation to work out the markings on the story rod is:

The measurement we just took from the datum to below the joist, subtracting the rebate to get an answer and dividing that by how many weatherboards it takes to cover a wall.

We do a running measurement from the bottom of the story rod with the first measurement being 190, and from then on in equal spacing’s of the effective cover.

We transferred these marks on the story rod across to the cavity battens on the house, and used a straight edge to transfer these marks over several battens at a time. A chalk line is also very good.

 

 

We need to plan the lengths of board we use first, on frontage view of the house and eye level we want to make sure joints in the weatherboards are staggered well. We want to plan the lengths so we get as little wastage as possible and that we could get two useable lengths out of one. We want a stagger to be at least 2 cavity battens away.

Where there is a window or door in the wall we need to plan which boards we use as we don’t want joints too close to the frame, or directly below or above. We usually will need to cut into the boards so they fit around windows and doors; we use the jig saw for this.

 When cutting the weatherboards we always cut the scarfing cut first (this will be an open cut) then measure to the corner for the following mitre or straight cut. A good way is to measure from where the jointing cut is (half way across the batten) to the corner and add 20mm for the mitre cut.

Whichever surface we want a 90 degree cut, we will place that flat side down on the drop saw bed.

Its best to cut into the thicker end or bottom end of the weatherboard first as this will be the visible edge and the weatherboard sometimes chips slightly at the end of a cut on the drop saw.

After this weatherboard is fixed the next weatherboard will run the opposite direction with a close cut to fit in nicely to the previous open cut.

We want the bottoms of the weatherboards joining cuts to be more accurately in line than the top as these will be visible once the house is complete and the tops will be covered.

The cut we use for exterior corners is a mitre cut, the drop saw is angled at 45 degrees and when joining weatherboards with this angle cut into them we get a 90 degree angle at the join.

Cutting the weatherboard to fit the meter box was tricky because of the flashing. We removed the door/window unit of the laundry to make it easier to run all the boards, this also made fitting the awkward weatherboard round that flashing easier.

The flashing comes down on an angle so we needed to cut the weatherboard to fit the flashing at this angle. We set the jigsaw to this angle and used a drill to cut each end of this cut, then tidied it up again with the jigsaw, this worked very well.

The weatherboards left till last were the short ones where the wall kicks in.

I used the bevel to get the angle of the weatherboard that had already been run into the corner.

I made that cut by setting the drop saw to this angle.

Using the square, I got the distance from the bottom of the weatherboard that this one was fitting into and measured up to the one above it to get the measurement for the notch. Then measured and cut for mitre cut.

As the weatherboards are all pre stained, any cuts we make were touched up with stain to protect the cedar.