TOPIC: New Wave Siding

You probably like staring at ocean waves because they are so calming.  How about new wave siding!

Reeeel perty, ain't it?

This is the result of an unprofessional installation.  This installer did not know what he was doing.  Three of the houses in this row look like this one.  I imagine the siding on all three was all installed by the same guy(s).

I call this work "7-11 Construction."  You simply cannot pick up "siding professionals" in the morning at 7-11 and expect quality work.  This kind of amateur work is the bane of this area.  It is why I find more problems on new construction than old.

This house is only 2 years old!

Vinyl siding can expand and contract almost 1/2" during the course of hot and cold days.  It is said that siding should be hung and not nailed.  Siding has slits along the top to give room for the nail to find a stud, yet still allow the siding to slide back and forth along the nail.  The trick is to leave the nail "proud" of the surface about 1/8 - 1/4".  If you nail it too hard, the vinyl cannot move as it needs to, and, obeying physics, it will be forced to move erratically as you see here.

This is a good quality siding.  What do you think accounts for the distinct 30 degree line from left to right?

I SEE WARPED SIDING LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME!!  It represents incredibly unprofessional and very amateur work.  It is typical of 7-11 construction.  It's one way you can tell a good builder from a bad one.  Good builders only employ qualified subcontractors.  Qualified subcontractors know what they are doing.  It is that simple.

My recommendation:  Take a look at any vinyl siding.  See if you can detect any anamolies in how it hangs or fits together one piece to another.  Make sure it isn't "New Wave Siding..."

Wow, that's unbelievable! And of course out of warranty.

You probably like staring at ocean waves because they are so calming.  How about new wave siding!

Reeeel perty, ain't it?

This is the result of an unprofessional installation.  This installer did not know what he was doing.  Three of the houses in this row look like this one.  I imagine the siding on all three was all installed by the same guy(s).

I call this work "7-11 Construction."  You simply cannot pick up "siding professionals" in the morning at 7-11 and expect quality work.  This kind of amateur work is the bane of this area.  It is why I find more problems on new construction than old.

This house is only 2 years old!

Vinyl siding can expand and contract almost 1/2" during the course of hot and cold days.  It is said that siding should be hung and not nailed.  Siding has slits along the top to give room for the nail to find a stud, yet still allow the siding to slide back and forth along the nail.  The trick is to leave the nail "proud" of the surface about 1/8 - 1/4".  If you nail it too hard, the vinyl cannot move as it needs to, and, obeying physics, it will be forced to move erratically as you see here.

This is a good quality siding.  What do you think accounts for the distinct 30 degree line from left to right?

I SEE WARPED SIDING LIKE THIS ALL THE TIME!!  It represents incredibly unprofessional and very amateur work.  It is typical of 7-11 construction.  It's one way you can tell a good builder from a bad one.  Good builders only employ qualified subcontractors.  Qualified subcontractors know what they are doing.  It is that simple.

My recommendation:  Take a look at any vinyl siding.  See if you can detect any anamolies in how it hangs or fits together one piece to another.  Make sure it isn't "New Wave Siding..."

Jay, here are a couple of things you may look at before being too judgmental
1 - are the windows low-E
2- does the sun rays reflection pattern match the melted siding
It is very possible that the suns rays are reflecting off the window on the left and melting the siding on the right
I have seen this happen on  houses as much as 20 feet away, the clay colored siding takes the most punishment.
We had the same issue with a town home the siding was melting from the reflection from their neighbor.
We replaced the siding 2 times because everyone thought it was oil canning. Always on the same location and only on the unit with clay colored siding.

There is a special screen made that can prevent this.

Next chance you get when you are out and about, stand directly in the reflection from Low E windows, (don't forget your sun screen)

Have a great day
Tim

Man that's some sad siding no matter what the cause.  I would have never thought about the window reflection melting vinyl siding.  Glad you pointed that out Tim.

Of course you are right Tim, I try not to be too judgmental.

However, there were three houses in this row just like this.  And all because of the angle of all of them to the sunset.  This happens for only a couple of months a year, and because of the relativity of the position of these houses to the sun's passage overhead.  When it is high in the sky, it beats down.

The other two houses did not have windows that would influence the siding.  They were not quite as bad, but wavy nonetheless.  This house, certainly the worst, was aided by the window's position.  Hence the defined line.  It is a real testament to how much heat reflectivity comes off of windows!  A screen would help, but on all of these houses the vinyl was nailed too tightly.  It was the first three in the row to have the problem.  I have to wonder if they did not figure out the siding guy was nailing too tightly and taught him something or fired him.  None of the other houses in the development were like this - well over 100.

I've seen several homes with the siding attached improperly, but nothing that bad. Never even considered the heat coming off the windows as possibly making the heating and cooling process worse. The only vinyl siding I have seen that bad is on a much smaller scale when people put there grill to close to the home.