TL;DR
A rain screen gap is the deliberate air space—commonly 3/8 to 3/4 inch, formed by furring strips or a drainage mat—left between siding and the water-resistive barrier so water that gets past the cladding can drain and the wall can dry by airflow. The gap needs vented openings at bottom and top, screened against insects, to create convective drying.
What it means
A rain screen gap is the deliberate air space—commonly 3/8 to 3/4 inch, formed by furring strips or a drainage mat—left between siding and the water-resistive barrier so water that gets past the cladding can drain and the wall can dry by airflow. The gap needs vented openings at bottom and top, screened against insects, to create convective drying. Fiber cement and wood siding warranties and coastal building codes increasingly call for this detail.
Where it sits in the glossary
Rain screen gap is part of the Trade jargon group inside the ProFix Directory glossary. Browse every term in this category from the glossary index.
Why Ohio homeowners should know it
This is a term Ohio homeowners encounter when reading contractor quotes, hiring paperwork, or inspection reports. Understanding it well enough to ask one good follow-up question is usually all the protection a homeowner needs.
ProFix Directory keeps definitions short on the index page and saves the longer context — Ohio-specific rules, where the term comes from, and which ProFix tools touch it — for these per-term pages so the term is easy to cite and easy to share.
ProFix tools that touch this term
See also
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