HOW TO INSTALL PIONEER LOG SIDING

Five Steps,
Any Flat Surface

Pioneer Log Siding installs on most any flat surface — as long as you can find the studs. Here’s how the pros do it, and how a capable DIYer can too.

Choose Your Cabin Style

Before you start, pick a look. Two classic frontier styles — and the install details flex to either.

CABIN STYLE — OPTION ONE

Upscale Frontier Cabin Retreat

Back in the pioneer days, city dwellers built more refined cabins. Logs were typically a uniform 12" wide, with clean chinking spaces of 2.5–4 inches.

Mix Pioneer Log Siding with wood shingles, board-and-batten, and river rock for a polished, lodge-style look.

CABIN STYLE — OPTION TWO

Pioneer Woodsy Cabin

Woodsmen outside town built with what they had — mixed log sizes, varied chinking, and whatever trees came easy before winter.

The result reads as a working cabin with a hundred years of stories. Stagger widths and gaps freely — imperfection is the point.

The Five-Step Install

Each step is straightforward. Work top to bottom on this list, bottom to top on the wall.

1

House Wrap

Make sure the home is well protected with a moisture wrap such as Tyvek. When installing corners, trim, or siding, we recommend screw guns with mini-head deck screws (any Home Depot has them). They hold better than nails, and the tiny holes blend in like wormholes in the finished wall.

2

Trim & Corners First

Install your house corners and door/window trim before the siding. That way the siding can butt cleanly up against them. Use transparent or matching caulk around every joint. For interior corners, rip your own 2″×2″ vertical boards.

3

Siding Installation

Start at the bottom and work your way up. Decide on your chinking-gap width, and feel free to stagger your siding cuts as you wish — pioneer cabins were never perfect, and yours doesn’t need to be either. The last piece should be milled to fit snug against the soffit.

4

Spacer Strips

Spacer strips save chinking material. Use 1/2-inch particleboard in 8-foot lengths, cut to whatever chinking gap you chose. They also support the next siding run above. Important: apply standard packing tape over the strips before chinking — chinking should only stick to the top and bottom of the siding boards, not the strips. Strips go on the house before the tape.

5

Chinking Material

We suggest Perma-Chink — flexible, strong, and available in several sandy tones. Contact kathy@permachink.com or call 425-952-2016 and ask for Kathy. She’s helped many Pioneer customers and can send a free chinking information kit with samples.

One warning: if you go with white chinking, it will upstage your siding and read like stripes from a distance. Pick a sandy tone and let the boards do the talking.

RECOMMENDED HARDWARE

Mini-Head Deck Screws

Available at any Home Depot. They hold the boards more securely than a nail gun and leave behind tiny holes that read like natural wormholes in the finished wall.

NEED CHINKING?

Perma-Chink — Ask for Kathy

Email kathy@permachink.com or call 425-952-2016. Request the free information kit with sandy-tone samples — she's helped Pioneer customers for years.

QUESTIONS DURING INSTALL?

We’re One Phone Call Away

If you hit a question on the job site, give us a call. We’ve answered nearly every install question there is — and we’d rather you get it right than guess.

Call (360) 544-8338 →

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Five Steps, Any Flat Surface