I have a question for a commercial application for the exterior of an ICF building.  The building in question could see some hearvy abuse from golf  balls and children throwing lacrosse balls (its big in Virginia).  My question is has anyone used the Hardie panel stucco before and how durable is it compaired to regular stucco?  The fear with regulalr stucco, is that the lacrosse ball or golf ball will dent it.

Has anyone used it before?  What is the best way to finish this type of system?  What do you think?

Thanks as always.

renangle

With the exception of brick, anything is vulnerable to that kind of abuse. I am not familiar with the hardi product, but with acrylic stucco we used to use the heavier fibremesh on the bottom in vulnerable areas and once we got above windows the lighter standard product was fine.

Stucco sheets by J Hardie are good in certain applications. Depending on what it is installed on or over will govern its strength Cementatious conventional stucco with a 5/8" to 3/4" application is a pretty impact resistant coating. The beauty is it can be repaired easily if needed whereas some synthetics don't patch easily. I would choose stucco first and not worry about the mechanical fastening aspects of installing the siding on the ICF.

National Gypsum makes a product called Perma Base cement board that is conventionally used in place of green board as an underlayment in bathrooms and kitchens (1/4" and 1/2"). I have seen it used as the base for synthetic stucco systems. Basically it is screwed to the ICF webs like interior drywall, taped/sealed, then texture/color coats applied.