Roller for exterior painting

Looking to repaint the exterior of my home this month. My siding is old vertical panels of Douglas Fir with very shallow grooves every 6 inches or so, but essentially a very flat surface. It is a 2 story house and I am only painting the top half. I do not have access to scaffolding hence the interest in using a roller with a long extension pole. I'm having a hard time finding positive recommendations for rollers.

 

Considered renting a man lift?
Going to have to use a thicker nap roller to try and get most of the low spots, but will need to be back brushed to reduce runs and hit the spots the roller will not hit and all the detail work around windows, and up under the soffits.

 

I'm not sure I totally understand what you are asking

There are 2 things to consider; the nap of the roller cover and the length of the extension pole. I generally use a heavy nap [3/4"-1:] dependent on the depth of the grooves and texture] I'll apply enough paint to flood the grooves so everything gets coated with paint, as the paint starts to set [before it dries] I'll take the same roller but fairly dry and reroll the substrate to get rid of the runs and level it all out nicely. Roller poles come in different lengths but the longer they are the harder they are to control. Normal sizes for adjustable poles are; 2'-4', 3'-6', 4'-8', 6'-12' and 8'-16'

What is the bottom half of the house covered with?

 

The top half of the house is vertical panels of Douglas Fir butt jointed. The bottom half is standard horizontal that are overlapped similiar to shingles.

The pole I have is adjustable and will extend to the eaves and gutters. I have a corner attachment to deal with the 2x2 that seperates the fir panel from the eaves. Like I said its a mostly flat surface and the groove in the panels is less than a 1/16 deep.

So heavy nap roller then? And of course the best paint I can afford and backroll to eliminate the orange peel look.

 

A heavy nap serves too purposes; it holds more paint and makes it easier to contact the grooves.

I didn't know if you had to be overly concerned about drips getting on the 1st floor. Since it paints too, just keep an eye out for drips and knock them down with a brush/roller while wet and they won't show after the bottom siding is painted.