posted 06-05-2005 17:23               

We don't often walk barefoot but when we do, in the sun, the material is like walking on sand at the beach. Yeouch - HOT

My Timbertech has not faded. It has been improperly installed by the contractor and needs to be ripped out.

It looks lovely on the house across the street. They have trex but it faded to a very light grey.

We are doing brick this time around and it isn't nearly as expensive as I thought it would be.

Plastic is plastic is plastic

posted 06-05-2005 18:27               

So far, it has been easy to work with. It is one of the ones that uses clips under the boards to hold it. Hence the surface is free of screws and nails.

I agree that the surface seems softer than treated wood so that scratching could be an issue. It does come with a 10 year warranty. Since the new treatment that replaced CCA treatment of exterior wood has a much shorter expected life than CCA, the 10 year warranty is probably a good deal.

Big thing on installation is that support has to be on 12" or 16" centers for composites rather than the 24" centers used with treated wood. This is because the composites have a much greater tendency to flex than does wood. The other issue is a need to allow for expansion. One product that really looks nice, EON, requires slotted holes for any screws that pass thru the material. That certainly increases the installation effort/cost.

At least in this area, Home Depot and Lowes were totally useless as far as being sources of information or material, to say nothing of being high priced. I ended up buying my material from a big local independent lumber yard.