Are you going to paint or stain them? We bought fir doors, and ours are stained. I think they look nicer than stained pine would have. Fir is also a denser more stable wood, but I'm not sure if/how that affects their long-term performance.

Hi, Thanks for the suggestion. Couple more questions: (1) Is the "Sikkens Cetol Door & Window" a penetrating oil or waterborne? (2) What stain/sealer color do you recommend to go on first. We want a light doug fir look but would like to see some of the grain to make it pop more. (3) Any idea where they sell Sikkens in San Francisco bay area? I've called couple Ben Moore resellers and they do not have it.

I own a collection of all wood Marvins - no clad for me either due to being a historic property. Most of mine are the VG fir exterior and interior upgrade, but I do have one pine unit that was my first order (learned my lesson). I also looked at the Lowen products closely and my neighbors house is done with them. Lowen are nice, but have less options then Marvin and a very very limited dealer network. If things go south with your Lowen dealer, there is likely not another one in your state. The basic Marvin pine units are a mixture of solid pine and finger-jointed pine - if you read their architectural specs you will see this in small print, but not in the consumer catalog. In my experience the exterior trim, sill, etc were all finger jointed pine. My pine unit was primed outside and clear stain grade inside so the inside faces are solid or at least thick veneers. The jamb is also solid and cover up what lies beneath. Marvin's VG fir exterior and interior are a huge up-charge as you've seen, but the wood is solid without veneers (except if you get interior screens etc). Here in the NW a moist climate - finger jointed pine will rot for sure. From my experience, moisture kills pine and kills the glue in finger joints even worse. I had to replace some out just the other day - 12 years old - and painted/caulked every 2 years. Also, not entirely related, but since this is a historic property if you must match the existing brickmould/casing and Marvin doesn't have that profile you need without going to their Signature level, you can always get the windows without brickmould/casing (jambs only) and have your carpenters trim out the window with casing you can get reproduced locally at a nicer lumber yard. There is usually a ~$100-150 charge to replicate a knife for a trim profile, but you'll be ahead of signature costs and can have enough made to fix up any other windows with damage. Go fir here too. Finally, be careful if you are getting very large operable windows that are at or near the limits of their sizing chart - suggest mulling together two or more smaller units to create a similar total dimension.

They are pretty much interchangeable with regards to use in a potting mix. And I think if you do more research, fir bark tends to be harder than pine bark and actually does hold up longer, but not of any significant difference. But that is fir bark from Douglas firs, which are not really firs at all :-) But most conifer bark, if appropriately sized, will work equally well. That includes orchid bark, repti-bark, pine bark fines or a fine textured (not shredded) bark mulch.