csparkman78 your house siding is just what we are looking for! How did you get that look? Thanks.

Going thru the same thing. Husband wants Hardy plank. We are doing real stone and either timber wood or mountain sage and I want the cedar shake in the peaks. We would like to be maintaince free. Would like to have same product, Any suggestions?

Cindy McNail Seabastin, if you choose to do any stain or paint process on the Hardi board or shingles it will eventually need to be redone at some point. One person above said his gad been on for 8 years, but most need redoing depending on sun exposure every 5 to 10 years. The only way to be maintance free would be to buy in a collie you want/like. Even then with lots of direct sun exposure it could still fade enough you might want to redo it at some point.

Unfortunately the stain that most people are trying to apply to fiber cement is failing to last. So don't waste money & time on it. Big disappointment ahead. Pick a go 20-30 year paint and enjoy your home.

Carolina colortones does the cedar look staining on site so the builder does no painting.they have a special technique by spaying on to the boards as they lay flat which allows paint to pool in the waves of the board so as to appear very much like cedar. Ask for samples and if possible go visit their facility .talk with guy cambell.

They do shakes the same way

At Custom Home Specialists, Inc. in Belton, SC, we do use our flow-coater prefinish paint machine to flood the fiber cement board. This process floods the board with a special stain formulated for fiber cement. The stain settles in the grooves of the panel to give the appearance of real wood. Feel free to contact us. We've done numerous jobs with this type of request and would be happy to provide samples run through our machine. I'm attaching a couple of pictures.

It looks just like the above examples. Where r u building.

Those of you that have used the Superdeck Duckback Wood Grain Fiber Cement product......how is it working for you? I have read in some articles that it is peeling? I was planning to use it on my concrete shingles. Thanks for your help.

So, just got off the phone with Superdeck, commercial division. They say that they are no longer making Duckback Wood Grain Fiber Cement products. Has anyone found something else that works?

We used carolina colortones in North Carolina and they also horizontally flood the hardi boards with stain so it settles in the grooves and gives a great cedar look .we have been very pleased now for 4years .will try to send pics that show the most detail.

@tigerjackson - Thanks for the info. For our build, unless we want to take down the hardi shingles and start over, we need to find something that will work with that product. Your house looks great.

Vicky Shirey
What did you end up doing? We are in the same situation. Our hardie shingles are installed. We want them to look like cedar but and getting frustrated and trying to figure this out before I just say paint it!!!

Hi Jenniferfelix1, We decided on painting to coordinate with stone work. There are some paint colors that look similar to cedar, but they clashed with our brick. It looks nice, even though it wasn't the look we were going for. Best of luck to you. Vicky

vicky shirey, will you post a picture of how it turned out?

jenniferfelix1, what did you decide? I'm in the same situation with the hardie shingles and feel exactly the same as your mentioned above.

tigerjackson, are there any options for this type of service in my area that you are away of? We live in Vancouver WA/Portland OR area.

@Rozanne Bass, Sorry for the delay. We have had rain and I had to wait for the weather to clear.

@ Rozanne we provide this service in Seattle and do travel to your area. if you are interested in getting a quote from us give us a call or message.

Thank you
David

@Rockin' Fine Finish.. Can you show me a picture?

@ vickey shirey It turned out beautiful!! Thanks for posting pictures!!

Hi, I live in Cattanooga, TN and in the beginning stage of building. We really like the look of cedar shake but not the maintenance. Does anyone know of a place in TN that would carry these products? Thanks!

Hi. I never got to respond to the question above on what we ended up doing. Well I got tired of trying to find a company that could stain the hardie so I started playibg around and ended up using exterior paint and watered it down quite a bit and just painted it on. It ended up looking very good with variations in the color. I picked a color which ended up being a little more red then I wanted but the finish looks great and was very inexpensive especially since you water the paint down. It’s hard to see in the picture below but if you zoom in on the shingles you can see a little of the color variation. So my suggestion is to take a scrap piece of hardie and play with your paint recipe. We stained the fence the same color to match we’ve had to deal with so many obstacles- ugly brick color and trying to blend in the addition my father built on when it was his house but it looks a whole lot better then it did! Hope this helps.

Sorry. You can see the shingles in this picture a bit better. If a better picture would help please let me know and I’ll take one.

@Jenniferfelix1 this is exactly the information I have been looking for! Thank you! Did you use a colored primer prior and did you use a brush or rags? I have read several articles about using rags and layering the colors starting with a yellowish primer.

@kellipope83 is this close to what you are looking for? This color shown is our Hemlock stain color applied to LP SmartSide Staggered shingles but we can apply the same stain color to Hardie, Allura or Nichiha shake panels.

Fiber cement boards are perfect for exterior painting. They can be painted to have a specific look or color that is so realistic looking that you may not be able to recognize that it isn’t really wood.

https://www.allurausa.com/blog/how-to-paint-stain-fiber-cement-siding

Great blog.. I'm currently adding a great room onto our house and have encountered many of the same issues discussed herein. I'm curious if anyone has considered using a rag-type paint method to paint their Allura, Hardie or Boral siding? I have a piece of Boral siding that I painted with a paint brush and painted with a rag. I found that the painting it with a rag allows for a two tone color and looks great. However, I don't know if it will last? If anyone has heard of this painting technique on exterior siding, please let me know! Thank you!

What type of paint are you using on the Boral Siding? Do you have any photos that you can post? Boral is a great product that takes paint rather well and should last a long time as long as it is installed properly - follow the manufacturers recommendations for sure.

@kellipope I used a light peach-ish, flat primer, which I got by matching a paint chip to the lighter part of the grain of wood I was looking to imitate. Flat because it'll adhere better over flat, and because the drag on the brush as you apply it is desirable, especially on the fiber cement that isn't molded to look like raised grain.

We renovated and added on to our cedar board home. The cedar had areas prone to mold and rot and was requiring a lot of maintenance

We decided to use Hardie but we wanted to keep the cabin type look. We were told that it couldn't be done but I had the pictures online to prove that it could.

The product that we used was the Duckback stain I believe it was originally Certainteed and is no longer either- We also have some that came from Sherwin Williams- I believe that they have picked up the duckback product.

You can see on the porch we left the original cedar as it was in good condition and under the stones.

...i had read about people using a spray gun to apply the duckback products for a wood-look so we tried that, but did not like the outcome. Our contractor recommended a painter who was talented at painting on different surfaces. We love the outcome and are finally on to landscaping!

We are building and we are doing the whole exterior in Hardie board. We want that cedar color. Anyone have any ideas?

use the super deck products from sherwin to achieve that look

You are going to need to use an acrylic latex paint on Hardie board to maintain the warranty of the product. Before using anything else please contact Hardie direct for a list of approved paints.

I agree with Rockin' Fine Finish.

it seems that Certainteed went to Duckback and eventually to Sherwin Williams.

We had a cedar home that we changed to hardie. We went with the teak which is more of a red color as the choices were minimal and the other color looked too yellow. There seems to be more color choices now.

These are the products we ordered. We used the S.W.

sorry about the dirty cans

we did this house 3 years ago and it has held up beautifully

I missspoke about the Certain teed product.

my research on the product was over 5 years ago. ‍♀️

i believe that is the fiber cement board product that is pre-colored

The product from Sherwin Williams on our Hardi plank has shown no signs of wear in the 3 years plus

pecantrees- Did you stain your siding with Superdeck? I have lp smart siding or fiber cement siding and want it to look like natural wood -walnut color. Just wondering if your post was referring to staining you cement board. I keep getting told staining won't work with cement board, it will chip or fade away. Any advice?

For future readers: All cement fiber products take ACRYLIC stain, never OIL stain. (Duckback, Cabot, etc. all made acrylic versions) Hence the ongoing confusion, even among dealers. I use the term 'ACRYLIC CEMENT COATING' to avoid panicking people at the word 'stain'. Ha

The process is not easy to field apply, & requires multiple layers of semi-transparent stain over a solid base-coat. Without the solid base, UV light will break down the primer & coating may not last long. This application is best prefinished flat in a prefinishing factory for a consistent finish. You definitely need a specialty coating & should not apply retail oil or acrylic deck & wood siding stains. You can order it through many quality lumber & specialty siding suppliers custom prefinished on LP SmartSide, Hardie, Allura, Nichiha, or KWP. Search for “prefinishing” on google.

We tested the product from Superdeck which was Duckback. it is made for cement board. if you zoom in to my picture above you can read that. When we called the company we were told the product was sold to Sherwin Williams. It is Kem Aqua which is a water based product. So, it works as a stain but is not technically as it is not oil based.

That is correct - and that would be one of the specialty coatings available that I was referring to. It is not readily available to the general public as it is generally sold through an OEM / Industrial SW store (if your local store has even heard of it). It is only field applicable for very talented painters (ideally with a background in faux finishing) & it is extremely difficult to paint consistently on a job site. A factory prefinisher can apply the same look continuously on 10,000+ LF without any odd variations in appearance. That would take an insane amount of effort and handling to do outside of a factory environment.

We hired a guy specifically because he was known for faux finishing. he had never used the product before. He did an awesome job on our 5,000 sq. ft.home. He even used the product on our electoral boxes.

Is there a hardi stain that matches the ducks back mahogany stain ? I used it 14 years ago and Will need to touch up in the next year or so !

peacantrees - can you share the name of the faux painting person - where are you located?

We are located in Louisiana

his name is Joe Robar Jr.

HU-384617075 did you find a solution to restain over your duckback mahogany stain? We have the same stain and would love a comparable product. It seems a similar product no longer exists.