Four-ingredient recipes are popular for busy families. Yet not all recipes are for eating, and at least one is a sure-fire way to protect your Sacramento-area home: fiber cement siding. What is fiber cement siding made of? There are four ingredients: Portland cement, sand, cellulose fibers, and proprietary components. Water makes the mixture mixable. 

Four Ingredients

Fiber-cement siding is formed from those four simple ingredients in an efficient, environmentally friendly process:

  1. Portland cement, made from iron, clay, and limestone, acts as a binder.
  2. Cellulose fibers or wood pulp makes the siding flexible and resilient.
  3. Silica sand works as a filler; sometimes, fly ash is used, or the two can be used in varying amounts.
  4. Better manufacturers add performance-enhancing, proprietary ingredients to increase the quality, durability, and finish of the fiber cement siding.

Water is used to dissolve the cellulose fibers and activate the Portland cement. Because fiber cement siding is a human-made product using the simplest ingredients mined and harvested from the earth, its manufacturing process can be tightly controlled. 

How It’s Made

Factories specializing in this innovative, asbestos-free siding material take in raw materials at one end of the production line, then:

  1. Mix the materials.
  2. Form the mixture into sheets.
  3. Imprint the desired pattern into the sheets.
  4. Run the sheets through autoclaves to cure.
  5. Machine-cut the sheets into workable panels.
  6. Finish all four sides of each panel.
  7. Paint all four finished sides.
  8. Sort, stack, and package panels for delivery to your local siding installer.

So Right

Fiber cement siding is right for your Sacramento-area home because those four ingredients (plus water, of course) can be fine-tuned for precise quality control. Together they mix and blend and cure to a resilient, tough, long-lasting product that can mimic wood grain, stone, stucco, etc. 

Fiber cement siding has many advantages over wood or vinyl siding. It is:

  • Non-combustible—Fiber cement siding will not ignite when exposed to a direct flame; it will not contribute fuel to a fire.
  • Designed and built to prevent damage from moisture and rot.
  • Engineered to stand up to the demands of the California climate.
  • Unappealing to woodpeckers, termites, and other pests.

Your Sacramento-area home benefits from Straight Line Roofing & Construction’s extensive range of exterior home offerings. We can provide expertise in roofing, siding, gutter systems, solar panels, and home accessories. Contact us today to learn more about what we can do for you!