The station behind the numbers
NOAA's engineering weather data for Bangor International Airport lists a 50-year basic wind speed of 100 mph (3-second gust at 33 feet), a 100-year rainfall rate of 2.3 inches per hour and about 70 freeze-thaw cycles in an average year.
Those are the airport station's figures as NOAA gives them. They aren't measurements at your house, and the wind and rainfall numbers are design values for rare events, not a typical week. This page uses them for one kind of work: finishing the horizontal and outdoor wood around a home, where weather hits hardest.
Why decks wear faster than walls
A wall sheds water. A deck holds it. Rain, snow and meltwater sit on the boards, soak into end grain and work into every fastener hole. With about 70 freeze-thaw cycles in an average year at the station, that water has many chances to freeze inside a board's surface fibers and loosen them. Finishes on decks, porch floors, stair treads and rail caps wear much faster than the same product on siding, and foot traffic adds to it.
Stain, paint or something in between
- Penetrating stains soak in and wear away gradually. They usually need recoating more often, but the recoat is simpler because there's little to peel.
- Solid-color stains look more like paint and hide more of the grain. They can peel on horizontal surfaces if water gets under them.
- Porch and floor paints make a continuous film. They look crisp, but once water gets under the film, scraping is part of every future job.
On a walking surface, ask the painter what they'd use and how it will look in a few seasons, not just on the day it's finished. The deck and fence staining page explains the choices in more detail.
Getting the wood ready
Most finish failures on outdoor wood trace back to the surface:
- gray, weathered fibers should be cleaned or lightly sanded away so the new finish reaches sound wood;
- mildew should be cleaned off, not coated over;
- old film finishes that are lifting have to come off where they're loose;
- the wood has to be dry, which can take days after washing or rain.
Ask how long the crew waits between cleaning and staining, and how they check the wood is dry enough.
Fences
Fences have two faces, posts that sit in wet ground and rails that catch water on top. Staining both sides costs more but evens out how the boards weather. Ask whether the price covers one side or both, the tops of posts, and the bottom edges near the soil. Plants growing through the fence need cutting back before work, and someone should say in writing who does that.
Rail caps and stair treads
These take the most wear for their size. A painter may suggest a different product for treads and rail caps than for the rest of the deck, or an extra coat. That's a reasonable conversation to have, and it should show up in the written scope.
The Maine Attorney General on contractors
The Maine Attorney General says Maine does not license or regulate home contractors. In practice that means the details of the job live in the paperwork between you and the painter. Ask for the product names, the preparation and the number of coats to be written down.
Upkeep between big jobs
- Sweep leaves off the deck before winter so they don't hold water on the boards.
- Keep snow shoveling gentle on finished boards; metal edges scrape through a finish.
- Wash off mildew in spring before it settles in.
- Watch the treads and rail caps for the first gray patches. A light recoat there costs much less than stripping the whole deck later.