Western Red Cedar: The Best Finishes, Treatments and Stains & How to Maintain It

Western Red Cedar, or Thuja plicata in scientific terms, is a species native to North America’s Pacific (northwest) coast. It has since been introduced to the USA.

You don’t need us to tell you how beautiful it is. Cedar’s colour — a seductive pinkish-brown with its warm crimson tints — works well in practically any outdoor setting. It can be smoothly integrated into a wide range of architectural concepts and visions thanks to the variety of finishes offered.

It not only looks great, but it also functions well. Western Red Cedar has a naturally high resin content, as well as excellent size retention. This provides it with exceptional natural pest and rot resistance, as well as a lengthy life span.

So, to keep it looking and working at its best for as long as possible, some treatment and maintenance could be in order.

The first step is to select a treatment. Let’s have a look at it in more detail.

The best oils, gets done and medicines for Western Red Cedar cladding, fencing and decking
Medicines for cedar wood can be extensively positioned into these gatherings: misty, hazy, straightforward or untreated.

Cedar wood is pitch and tar free, and that implies that completions are held very well by the wood as long as they are applied before the enduring system has started.

For the most part, dark medicines (like paints and strong shading finishes) offer higher assurance to the detriment of darkening a greater amount of the wood’s regular appearance.

Medicines that are more straightforward – like normal stains and water-repellent additives – typically offer additional unassuming security from the components, yet hold a more noteworthy measure of the lumber’s regular magnificence.

Top tip – Western Red Cedar has awesome outside finish-maintenance characteristics, particularly when smooth, instead of finished. Hence, assuming you’re especially inspired by life span, search for planed cedar.

1. Murky or strong shading

A careful covering or two of an acrylic-based paint is by a long shot the most defensive of the completions on offer. It will safeguard the lumber from dampness and enduring, yet will totally hide the wood’s tone and grain – so make a point to pick a wood paint of your ideal tone.

These are additionally strong shading stain gets done, which give a misty completion while holding a portion of the first surface. They offer exceptionally solid insurance against the components.

Paints and strong shading completes permit you to assume full responsibility for appearance, adding a touch of energy, shading or appeal to a completed cedar project – however they’re not for the ambivalent!

2. Cloudy stains

In the event that you’re not intrigued by a hazy completion, there are as yet numerous ways of keeping your Western Red Cedar looking normal, while keeping it very much safeguarded. For this, a hazy stain may be the ticket.

Contingent upon the item picked, hazy colors actually offer up a few fascinating, inconspicuous changes to the wood’s tone, articulating grains and bunches – just as bearing the cost of extraordinary security. Cloudy completions can be oil-based or normal.

Oil-based insurance enters further into the wood and typically give a more intense difference in shading, giving a more noteworthy arrangement of security from the components.

Regular, water-based insurance doesn’t enter as profoundly, yet bear the cost of a decent arrangement of assurance, containing fungicides that hinder the development of mold. They’re viewed as more harmless to the ecosystem.

There are many sorts of cloudy stains available.

Owatrol Textrol HES is a genuine illustration of a strong, oil-based assurance for cedar wood against climate and UV, accessible in a scope of colors from for all intents and purposes clear to a charcoal. While hiding a portion of the normal tone, an all around picked finish like this can upgrade the grain of your cedar.

A characteristic, water-based cedar wood finish – like Owatrol Aquadecks (Honey) – will likewise keep the lumber in great condition while giving a lovely completion. A decent oil or water-based insurance commonly goes on for a considerable length of time up to first upkeep.

3. Straightforward additive and oils

For a straightforward get done with some unassuming assurance, think about a layer of water-repellent additive, or a fading oil. There are a scope of items available.

Albeit these don’t give great UV security, this kind of red cedar wood additive will save the wood’s warm tones for longer.

Remember that, over the long run, the cedar will in any case climate to a dark tone; albeit this will happen all the more leisurely and you’ll hold the wood’s wonderful, regular tones and patina.

We’d suggest something like Owatrol H4 Wood as an astounding climate defender that doesn’t contain any UV channels; permitting the cedar to silver normally.

Obviously, for any completions applied, make a point to observe the producer’s singular rules.

Which cedar treatment would it be advisable for me to pick?
Things being what they are, to paint or stain cedar weatherboards? Or on the other hand potentially leave them untreated? There’s no set in stone response: your decision will rely upon your plan inclination and required degree of insurance.

While picking the right item for securing cedar cladding (or any outside cedar wood project); you’ll need to find some kind of harmony.

What look would you say you are later? To hold the cedar’s excellence with some security, pick a hazy stain. Assuming you’re looking to gradually procure the recognized endured appearance, pick a straightforward oil. To definitely assume responsibility for your wood’s tone with most extreme security, a murky completion will get the job done.

How much assurance do you need or need? How much daylight and downpour hitting your wood will abbreviate the life expectancy of the completion applied; so assuming that it’s uncovered, consider a solid, oil-based color or paint.

How much upkeep would you say you are ready to do? Some cedar tasks can be difficult to reach; so you should pick a completion that doesn’t need to be reapplied or topped up over and over again. Then again, your cedar may be effectively available, making a reapplication each two or three years a doddle.

Western Red Cedar is a beautiful, durable wood that is perfect for a variety of applications. Here at Bayou City Lumber, we carry a wide selection of Western Red Cedar lumber and other cedar products. Our experts can help you choose the perfect cedar for your project, big or small. Contact us today to learn more about our Western Red Cedar lumber!