Looking at getting our house re-sided and thinking about my options... I'm sure this issue has been debated all over the internet for years, but what are your opinions? I like the idea of vinyl not needing to be painted/maintained, but what about sun damage? Is Hardie just flat out the better product?

Vinyl is pretty tolerant of a bad installation. Hardie is *NOT* tolerant of a bad install, but provides fire protection equivalent to brick that Vinyl will not. Vinyl in my experience is easy to damage, Hardie is pretty durable. I think Hardie looks better.

The big thing is the install. If you have a crummy install (familiarize yourself with the contractor directions and make sure that they follow them), i.e. the way that Stylecraft does it, then you can kiss your investment goodbye.

There are also some LP Smartside options you may look at. They are wood siding products but have a pretty good warranty, cheaper than Hardi. I have been looking to get new siding for a while now and think Hardi is the best, but also the most expensive.

Hardie.

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There are also some LP Smartside options you may look at. They are wood siding products but have a pretty good warranty, cheaper than Hardi. I have been looking to get new siding for a while now and think Hardi is the best, but also the most expensive.

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I was pricing options and found out that T11 is actually a bit more expensive than HardiPanel. I was surprised ... ... but not that surprised!

We have hardie and really like it. Here is a shot of it during construction (it was the best close up I could find).

There is also Homeowners Insurance benefits to having Hardie rather than Vinyl.

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I was pricing options and found out that T11 is actually a bit more expensive than HardiPanel. I was surprised ... ... but not that surprised!

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T1-11 in either 4" or 8" should be $17-20 while hardi will be ~$25 per sheet.

Lowes had T-11 priced at $31/sheet Vs the $27 for Hardi. You can probably get it cheaper elsewhere but that was the price I remember seeing as I walked down that aisle earlier this week.

Price of wood must have gone up. I worked there in bryan for two years and hardi was always more expensive.

Over time, Vinyl will discolor and possibly sag. The key is getting high quality vinyl and a great installer. Make sure they do the vapor barrier right against the wall or you could end up with mold issues - water gets behind vinyl siding because seams aren't waterproof, and a good hailstorm can take out a few walls of siding if it's the thin cheap kind. Vinyl can look great and perform well for a long long time. Check out Variform's Timber Oak product Color Selector here.

Vinyl can look right on some applications, but look really out of place on others. For the right applications, the key is - don't go for the cheapest - go for the best and you'll enjoy it for years.

For applications where vinyl won't look right, I'd go with the hardboard and just prime/paint it.

LP SmartSide vs. Hardie

Warranty Comparison
LP SmartSide:
All products (trim, lap, soffit fascia) are covered by the same 5(labor and material refund)5/50 transferrable warranty

Fiber Cement:
Hardie Lap- 30 yr warranty (as of May 09) (not transferrable)
Cemplank Lap- 25 yr warranty
Trim- 10 yr warranty
Panel- 25 yr warranty

Product Attributes Comparison
LP SmartSide:
• 16’ lengths provide 33% fewer seams
• 1 HOUR Fire Rating
• NAHB found it installs a minimum of 12% (and up to 36% ) faster than fiber cement
• Absorbs significantly less paint than fiber cement
• Panels (8’,9’,10’) are structurally rated and can be applied direct to stud (no additional sheathing required)
• Silica-free- Environmentally friendly, safe, requires no special tooling- cuts like real wood
• Strong and flexible- significantly less breakage on jobsite
• Affordable
• Aesthetically Looks like natural wood
Fiber Cement:
• 12’ lengths result in 33% more seams
• Absorbs significant amount of paint
• Installs minimum 12% slower than LP SmartSide
• Not structurally rated
• Requires special tooling and masks, contains silica



OSB and Plywood are commodity's. Yes, wood has gone up but for the 80/20 rule, "engineered strand substrate Siding" skus will not spike like OSB or Plywood.

Hardie is fighting lawsuits in Australia, they changed thier warranty to 30 years and more importantly-Hardie has changed their intallation 3 times in 10 years. Hardie Lap is taking a spike too (no secrets in the industry) in Q2. So your looking at 4-5 bucks cheaper than Hardie

85 pound cement vs. 45 pound-stronger panel.

99% of house siding warranty with Hardie is voided. Why? If you countersink nails-it's voided. Guess what? Every house-especially the framing practices in Texas-is voided.

T1-11 is more expensive than SmartSide. Just like Plywood Sub-Floor, it's inferior to Value Added OSB (apa) but 4-5 bucks more than LP TopNotch or WY Edge Gold

Never seen much Vinyl but homeowners will tell you that it gives you very visible seams-Arkansas and Louisiana use more Hardboard than they do Vinyl-despite the improvements. It really comes down to durability.

If you ever are curious to see SmartSide in some form on a house-stop at a Tuff Shed (Lowe's Depot Parking lots) or stop by a Pulte, Bloomfield, Meritage, Onyx, Darling, DR Horton to name a few and you will see the difference.

Pulte has used SmartSide in Houston for 14 years. Siding still looks good, no repainting like you would with Hardie.

Hey, TheRealFan - How much do you know about the SmartSide material? Looking through the website, I've got a few unanswered questions.

- What's the difference between "strand" and "fiber" composition? Which is better -- which series would I want to install in this area (College Station, TX)?
- What is an example of a good quality primer?
- What's a preferred material for caulking/sealing? My instinct would be Big Stretch caulk given the thermal expansion/contraction factors here...

I worked with about 400sqft of the SmartSide panel this weekend, plus some of the SmartSide trim material as well.

So far I have really liked the product and found it to be easy to work with. The sawdust is extremely fine, thus if you have allergies or are sensetive to dust I would highly recommend using a dust mask.

Superspeck,

I use standard NP1 for caulking-I have used others but that's just what McCoy's had at the time. McCoy's-Bryan, TX is your best bet in the Brazos Valley as this particular McCoy's as far as SmartSide variety. Woodson, Callaway, Pro Build also have some different ones to choose from but the Distributor is in Texas so you really have about 160 skus or different lines of SmartSide so they should be able to get what you need in 2-3 business days.

SmartSide Strand is southern yellopine wafers infused with Zinc Borate, MDI resins and waxes (Termite killer, natural wood decay disrupter-a non toxic, simple salt impregnated into the strand-visine and toothpaste contain it so it's harmless)

SmartSide Fiber (engineered Hardboard to the builder lingo) is maple hardwoods (same formulation as Miratec trim) with the SmartGaurd Zinc Borate Treatment-This product is more available in West Texas and North Texas.

BOTH are covered by the 5/50 warranty.


Keep in mind, these are not "OSB Siding" or Trim craft "masonite". Same comparison with all the Maxiplank Cement vs. James Hardie. One has a 10 year liquid process making from Mexico, the other a more engineered layed cement process. Another example is Advantech Sub Floor vs. Plywood, Old Dogs will tell you "waferwood < plywood", not today. Commodity OSB is superior to CDX or Plywood (APA), while Advantech Rules all and it's Value Added OSB.

SmartSide comes primed like cement and actually only requires one coat of paint and is a non-pourous product. It's a paper paint based overlay that's infused on top and is very hard to chip or break the overlay, if you do, simply caulk it.

Strand is what I use and recommend due to the cedar curbside appeal-easier to work with IMO. Fiber is good too but strand is superior in strength and durability.

Precision Series is Strand

At a local distributor, ran across this product:

NichiBoard. Anyone had any experience good or bad, or comparisons to Hardi or SmartSide?

Nichi is very ex*****ive cementboard, it looks better than Hardie IMO.

It's pricier than Hardie, not sure why that happend

Interesting -- TruValue Lumber Yard in Wellborn had it priced cheaper than Hardi. It's the smaller (8 inch) instead of the 12" lap that I was going for, but for $5/board instead of $8/board...

[This message has been edited by superspeck (edited 5/9/2010 12:57p).]

Heh. And as for why you got filtered -- you can't say expensive if you flip the s and the i.

Hardie (fiber cement) is a great siding product to use over vinyl siding and it comes with a 30 year warranty. If you are looking for an alternative that is more durable over the Hardie siding, you might want to consider the SmartSide siding. It comes with a 50 year warranty. We have done many jobs in Texas with this product and homeowners love it. Here is a link with an article that I wrote that one might find helpful: Smartside Siding vs. Fiber Cement (Hardie) Siding

Greg Kapitan.

Timely reply

Call your insurance company. Make sure they will insure whatever you want to install.

Something tells me his insurance company won't cover something that was done 4.5 years ago.

Bumping super old threads.

spammers