Cleaning Cedar Shingles, The Products And Methods
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Cleaning cedar shingles is simple if you follow these tips and buy the right product to clean with. Cedar shingles must be cleaned to get the full life span out of the shingle. Cleaning the wrong way can shorten the life of your shingles and lead to early replacement.
Reasons to clean your cedar shingles; A new wood roof for an average size home could run close to ,000, to side a medium size home with cedar shingles is easily ,000, that alone should be enough reason to clean your shingles. Natural wood products are food for mold, mildew, algae, moss and lichen, when these types of fungus are attached to your shingles they are feeding on them, causing them to curl, crack and dislodge. Fungus also holds water and their roots could lead to leaks. To the eye, you want to keep your home looking new and clean, a clean exterior will add to the home's value.
The equipment you will need; Most of the equipment you probably already have, a ladder (with outrigger stabilizer bars for safety), a medium bristle scrub brush on an extendable pole, a garden style sprayer and a hose. I defiantly do not recommend using a pressure washer; the pressure will loosen and sometimes blow shingles right off the house.
High pressure also cuts anywhere from 1/8th to a inch of the shingle thickness, this for sure will lead to curling shingles. If you choose the right shingle cleaning product, you will not need the high pressure thus preserving the integrity of the shingle.
To clean correctly and effectively, start at your highest point and work your way down. Start by wetting down, not soaking an area only large enough to clean before it dry's. Mix your cedar shingle cleaning product up in a separate bucket then pour it into the pump sprayer. Spray your pre-moistened area with the product then gently work it into the wood with your scrub brush. When you have scrubbed the whole area, stand back and rinse with the hose until clear water is running off the shingles then move to the section below it or start the process again at the top of another section.
Finding the right cedar shingle cleaning product; Believe it or not this is the toughest part of the job. I strongly believe that if there is an environmentally safe cleaning product available then we should choose that one. Hazardous cleaning products such as bleach, TSP or chlorine based products will clean your shingles but there are more disadvantages to these products the advantages. First of all, they kill surrounding flowers, grass and shrubs. Secondly they severely dry out the wood shingles. Another reason is that they do not clean evenly, you will end up with some real light; almost white areas and some not so light. It will not look natural when you are finished. The smell from these products linger for weeks, if they drip on any painted surfaces, it will leave a stain. There are many reasons not to use toxic products. What you want to use is a product that is the opposite, environmentally safe, won't harm the plants, cleans evenly, and is non-staining with no strong fumes.
Choose an environmentally safe cedar shingle cleaing product, clean your shingles periodically and they will last and look new for a long time to come.
Article Source: Articlelogy.com
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