Telephone 01803 813 803 / 01752 600 066 - Monday to Friday 7.30 a.m - 5.00 p.m
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Cladding care
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Cladding care 
The first step in caring for your cladding is to ensure that it is installed carefully – all cross cuts on posts, battens and cladding should have been treated with Ensele end-grain treatment (not necessary with our imported red cedar). Any bushes or undergrowth should be cut back from the walls of the structure to allow the timber to dry naturally otherwise an excessive algae build-up might develop.Before any maintenance treatment is carried out it is recommended to begin by carefully power-washing the cladding to remove fungal growth, surface dirt and grit. The type of maintenance treatment will depend on what type of timber has been used for cladding – we will concentrate here on redwood cladding products. At Southern Timber we stock products that have been pressure treated, usually with Tanalith E – and we usually refer to these products as tanalised. This is a vacuum process where the timber is pressure impregnated with a preservative to reduce fungal decay. While it proves far more effective than dipping or spraying timbers a small amount of regular maintenance will provide extra protection against fading and weathering and keep your cladding looking good for longer. Fading colours When our cladding boards are supplied they normally have a green tinge to them, this is perfectly normal and is a green dye used in the Tanalith process. This green colour gradually changes into a more mellow light brown colour and then to a dullish grey. This discolouration is primarily caused by ultraviolet light. Some customers prefer to keep this mellow grey finish, but others will want to put a little colour back into the product. Customers wishing to maintain the original colour of the cladding need to buy a product with a good UV inhibitor to slow down the effects of this process. However, some pigment is needed in the treatment to provide effective UV protection - clear treatments generally provide minimal UV protection. Treatments that contain a colour pigment will provide better UV protection as well as introducing extra colour into the cladding. Rain, rain go away While we can’t stop the rain we can help slow down its decaying effects. Timber is a natural product and absorbs moisture from the surrounding air – this means timber tends to expand when wet and shrink when dry. In summer months this can lead to some cracking in cladding timbers. This is perfectly normal and when the wet weather returns the timber will tend to swell and the cracks will close again. We stock a range of Sadolin, Ronseal and Liberon products which penetrate into the timber to help preserve the timber and then provide a surface coating to minimise absorption of rainwater & moisture. These products will be added to the website during Spring 2009. |
