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Even though clapboard nailing isn’t rocket science, four carpenters will give you five opinions on how to do it. Here’s what you need to know:

► Place clapboard nails roughly l1/ in. from the bottom so they don’t enter the tip of the clapboard underneath, especially if you’re installing 1×8 clapboards or wider. Wide clap­boards are particularly likely to split if they are inadvertently nailed at top and bottom.

► Nail clapboards to stud centers. For guidance, snap vertical chalklines on the building paper over the stud centers; offset the clapboard butt joints by at least 32 in.

Lined-up nails look better, especially if you’re using a clear finish.

► Carpenters set nails; painters fill and paint them...

Before you start shingling, make sure that win­dows and doors are correctly flashed, that sheathing is covered with building paper—most pro shinglers prefer 15-lb. felt paper—and that exterior trim is installed.

Materials. For best results, use No. 1 grade cedar shingles. For a standard 5-in. shingle expo­sure, figure four bundles per square (100 sq. ft.). Always inspect the visible shingles on a bundle to make sure they’re uniformly thick (3з8 in.) at butt ends, of varying widths (on average, 6 in. to

CUTTING SHINGLES CROSS-GRAIN

12 in.), knot free, and reasonably straight grained. Installing shingles requires a lot of trim­ming, so you don’t want to be fighting knots and wavy grain. Shingle butts should also be cut cleanly and squarely across, not angled or ragged...

For clapboards and shingles, the two most important parts of the layout are establishing level for the bottom course and varying the expo­sure of subsequent courses so that they align with door or window trim, if possible. If a leveled water table has already been installed, skip the next section.

Establishing level. If there’s no water table on the house (see p. 132), the bottom of the first course of siding typically overhangs the sheath­ing by % in. to 1 in. Because the bottom edge of sheathing is seldom level, use a laser level or a water level to establish a level base line. Simple tripod-mounted laser levels are relatively inex­pensive and offer quick layout over long dis­tances without needing a helper. When set up correctly, they’re also quite accurate, usually within Уз in...

Although it may be tempting to rip out exterior trim that’s badly weathered or rotten, repair is often a better option if replacement trim would be expensive or difficult to remove. Before decid­ing either way, survey the extent of the rot and address its cause. Otherwise you’re treating only the symptom.

Replacing rotted sections is a good option when the bottom of an otherwise sound trim board has rotted away. Flat and square trim is easier to replace and match than molded trim. Rotted bottoms of corner boards and splash­boards are usually easy to cut free and replace, whereas punky doorsills or windowsills are prob­ably best repaired in place, using epoxy, as described in the next section.

Replacing the bottom of a rotted board is straightforward...