Cleaning Your Siding After a Fire

It's Spring.  And with weather like we've been having, many of us are feeling the itch to turn our attention to the exteriors of our homes.  We'd like to clean them up, spruce them up, get them looking good again after winter.

In fact, a customer of ours just posted a comment on our facebook page (which you should check out here and become a fan!) requesting that we talk about how to clean the siding of our homes.

Turns out he had a fire recently and a lot of the siding is now smoke-stained.  Now, with the nice weather (and with Tulip Time approaching), he's feeling the push to get that siding cleaned up and looking good again.  

So to hopefully help him out (as well as others of you with the same issues), here's the scoop when it comes to cleaning smoke damage from your vinyl or aluminum siding.  (And by the way, if your siding is simply dirty, you can skip straight to step 4!)

WHAT YOU'LL NEED:

•  Soot Sponge 
•  Broom/Tire Brush
•  Shop Vac
•  Jomax House Cleaner (available at RepcoLite and Port City Paints)
•  Hose or Power Washer
•  Garden Pump-Up Sprayer 

WHAT YOU SHOULD DO:

Step 1:  Dry Brush

The first thing to do when you've got smoke damage is to resist the urge to rinse it all down with water and various cleaners.  This often can make the mess worse and harder to clean up.  Instead, start with a broom or a tire brush and go over your siding, lightly brushing away as much of the loose debris and dry soot particles as possible.

Step 2:  Vacuum

Once you've done this, it's time to break out your shop-vac (with a brush attachment if you've got one).  Go over the siding again, removing as much of the soot and debris as possible.

Step 3:  Break Out the Soot Sponge

After you've done this, it's time for the Soot Sponge.  And, because this is likely a tool many of you aren't familiar with (I know I wasn't) let me explain it briefly.

Soot Sponges are also referred to as Chemical Dry Cleaning Sponges.  They're thick, porous and made of rubber.  Basically, they look and feel somewhat similar to a big eraser.

Soot Sponges are used dry.  This is important:  using water or detergents--at least in this initial cleaning stage--often results in smearing the stain around.  So use the sponge dry, lightly sweeping it over the stains in even motions and in only one direction, working from top to bottom.  When you do this, the sponge will function like an eraser and will remove dust and soot from your siding.

Once the surface of your sponge has filled up, you've got a couple options.  The best option is to cut away the dirty layer with a utility life, exposing a new clean layer underneath (be careful--I speak from experience). If you prefer not to cut away the old layers, you can wash the sponge out, but you must let it dry thoroughly before using it again.

Usually, you'll be able to clean about a 12' x 20' area with one 6" sponge. 

Step 4:  Clean and Rinse

After using the Soot Sponge to remove the bulk of the smoke stain from your siding, it's finally time to hit it with Jomax House Cleaner. 

Now, Jomax is a cleaner manufactured by Zinsser and it's a great product for safely cleaning your siding and removing everything from soot residue to mold and mildew.  Using Jomax to kill mildew is more effective than just using bleach and water.  It's also safer.  While bleach is added to Jomax, the bleach activator in Jomax increases the cleaning power of the bleach while at the same time bringing down its alkalinity to levels that are safe for surrounding plants or grass. 

With that said (and because I don't want angry phone calls/e-mails), I'd still suggest spraying nearby plants and grass down with water before you apply Jomax and immediately after you've rinsed it off your house.  You know--just to be safe.

 

OK, so pick up a quart of Jomax concentrate from RepcoLite, Port City Paints or Snyder Paints and mix it according to label directions.  

 

Using a hose or a power washer, wet a section of your siding (as well as your surrounding grass and plants) and then, using a standard garden pump-up sprayer, spray the Jomax mixture onto that section of your siding and scrub it lightly with a good scrub brush.  Work from top to bottom and when you've scrubbed a section clean, go ahead and rinse it before it has a chance to dry out and leave new streaky stains.

 

Work your way around the home in this way and before long, you should have things looking good again!

8 Easy Ways to Increase Curb Appeal

Increasing the curb appeal of your home doesn't need to be a paint project that lasts all summer long--you don't need to paint your entire home in order to bump up it's appearance. Oh, that always helps--and really, nothing will accomplish a complete renewal of your home than a new paint job--but it's not always necessary. Here are 8 sure-fire ways--easy ways--to increase the visual "pop" of your home:

1. FRONT DOORS: Your front doors can offer you a great opportunity to say something unique and interesting about your home. Many folks fall back on a safe standard--a maroon or a forest green--but don't let that be the case with your home. Branch out a little. Be a little daring. Go with a bright green, a bold red, a warm yellow. It's a small area in the grand scheme of things--after all, a front door is basically 21 square feet. So, it's a drop in the bucket when you think about the entire exterior of your home. But this little drop can have some impact if you pick the right color!f


2. GARAGE DOORS: Another surface that gives you a great opportunity when it comes to exterior decorating are your garage doors. Take a look at yours and see if there's a way to infuse some color into that surface. And really, don't feel you have to paint the whole thing one big, bright, bold color. You could paint it a slightly darker color than the rest of your trim and then use either a lighter or darker color yet to accent the different raised panels in the door. There are any number of creative things you could try--our point here is to just open your mind to the possibilities. Don't look at that door as just a big hunk of metal that hides the opening of your garage! Look at it as a canvas--a place to throw some color and increase the visual appeal of your home.


3. SHUTTERS: Most of our homes have shutters. And most of us have painted those shutters the same color as we've painted our front doors. And really, that's not necessarily bad. But, don't always assume that there are no other options. Look at your shutters and try to imagine what a color darker or lighter than your door color would do. What would another color altogether add? Shutters don't take up a lot of space and so a bright, bold color that WORKS with your other colors can infuse some significant life into a boring exterior.


4. LIGHT POSTS and RAILINGS: This is one of my favorite ideas--mainly because its just something I've never really given much thought to before. See, most of us spend time thinking about the colors we'll put on our doors or our siding that we never really give much thought to extraneous things like railings and light posts. Oh, we figure we'll just accent them in white or maybe black depending on the rest of the color scheme, but rarely do we ever give them much consideration on their own. So break out of that mindset. Give some thought to your railings and your lightposts. What colors could you put on those surfaces that would really infuse your home with interest?


5. LAWN FURNITURE: The fifth item we're going to talk about is something that's not permanently affixed to your home: lawn furniture. Many of us have Adirondack chairs or other items like this that take up a place of prominence on our yards. They are usually more practical than decorative--they're the places we hang out and relax over the summer months. But just because they're practical doesn't mean that they can't be decorative as well. Rather than rely on the standard white, why not branch out into some bold colors, some bright colors . . . some fun colors? Because these aren't permanent items, you can move them, put them away for the winter, etc. So, don't be afraid to go bold with your colors.


6. FLOWER BOXES: Not every house has flower boxes attached beneath the windows anymore. But for those of you who have these, don't forget that they can be used not just to carry a bunch of color in the form of flowers! They can also be painted with interesting colors to add a little excitement to the big blank exterior of your home. Because these are small, you can paint them easily and, if you put some time and thought into the color selection AND the flowers you plant in them . . . you could have an amazing summer result! So don't overlook them.


7. WINDOW TRIM: This one's an obvious choice, but again, so often, we overlook it on our own homes. So many times, we assume that trim needs to be either dark brown or white. But that's not the case. Oh, you want to be a little careful with your color choices because painting window trim isn't the most exciting or pleasant project out there . . . but don't be afraid to stretch your boundaries a little. Sometimes a slightly darker or lighter version of your siding or your front door accents can really "class-up" an exterior. So don't just settle on the standards--think bigger!


8. OUT BUILDINGS: One last area that we're going to cover in this article is your outbuildings. You know, those little sheds we've all got crammed full of lawnmowers and kids toys. Most of us paint them very conservatively. We turn them into little tiny duplicates of our homes--same colors, same look. Or, we branch out a little and coat them with a nice, safe white. Or, maybe a wood-colored stain. Well, I'm not saying it's the right answer for everybody, but for some of us, a bold color on a building like this can create a huge splash of visual interest for the exterior of your home. And by "bold", I don't mean it has to be red or bright green. It could be a deep, navy blue. It could be a charcoal building with lime-green highlights. It could be anything. Think about it!

Well, you get the idea. The point is this: think big! Be bold with your color choices and be creative with the surfaces you decide to paint. Small surfaces on and around your home can be painted quickly and easily for very little money. But these same surfaces, when coated with the perfect color, will slow traffic and walkers as they pass your house. They'll take a look. And they'll go home and they'll start looking for ways to add interest to their exteriors!