cherry lumber for siding

[Gary_B]

I was wondering if anyone has used cherry for exterior siding ? I know it makes beautiful furniture, but when I am sawing for desired lumber, such as nice grain patterns, you still end up with undesireable boards, and would like to find a good use for it, plus I am in need of siding for lumber storage. Unfortunately I dont have any popular or cedar, pine to saw, our property consists of mostly cherry, elm, maple. I have used locust for items touching the ground, and I think it works just as well as treated lumber, but very hard to drive a nail into, unless drilled first.

[Rooster]

Gary,

Is it me, or is there a siding theme in the new threads?  ???

So you have the cherry logs, and a mill, ...right?

Instead of milling your siding out of cherry, could you still mill the cherry and sell it to pay for more appropriate pine/spruce siding or logs?

We all want to use what is readily available to us...it seems to be in our blood, eh?  But you have stuff that I assume others want, why not sell or barter for what you do want?

This way you can still harness the advantage of your mill and your own sweat, and also be known as a darn good material acquisitioner!  (Did I spell that right? :-\)

Rooster

[Gary_B]

Rooster,
That is very well true, but I use the select parts of the cherry log for furniture, but like the heart of the cherry doesnt have much figure, or grain patterns. Which I guess if you rated it, probally would be like #2 common grade. Then second of all I live in the Ohio Valley where cherry is pretty common, and  the market for cherry is a bit lower than other areas. I have just a small manuel mill so its hard to compete with the larger operations, most of the lumber I saw I use for my own projects.

[Magicman]

Cherry works very well outside.  It seems to turn water well and is rot resistant.  Here's a 5 year old cherry deck.  I finally put a coat of Thompson's (sp?) Water Seal on it last year.

[Gary_B]

Looks like that cherry worked good on your deck, well I am about to see how it works on the sides of a wood storage building, my lumber is taking up to  much room in my workshop.
Thanks
Gary