Trex Deck Rebuild

A good friend had a deck that had a rotting sub-structure beneath some fairly original Trex decking that seemed in reasonable shape, though most Trex decking from that era had been recalled due to flaking. But the rotting underlying substructure was causing the deck surface to undulate in a way that was becoming quite dangerous. Sorry, I have no picture of the “before” deck. 

I really should spend some time getting "before" starting demolition.  This was a tricky job because to save money we salvaged all of the existing decking, which is already cut to exactly the right shape.  Therefore, we cut the decking off the rotting substructure and placed it in order on the lawn while we rebuilt the substructure.  Wish I had a picture of that too.

Plus we added a built-in bench on the south end.  Here is the structure beneath the seat.

Plus we replaced the original bench surfaces after sturdifying the posts.  Solid, 3 feet deep into concrete.

Deck and benches complete.

Paint, Shutters and a Fence

You can see that I’m catching up on posting projects that I did last summer. Many more to follow. I was quite busy all summer. 

In fact, what usually happens is I get done with a project and the customer asks me to keep going. Here, the customer that I built the redwood deck for asked me to paint his house, build him some shutters, and build a fence. 

This threw something of a wrench into my scheduling of projects.

The customer was from Connecticut, and has an affinity for the imagery of spe whales, so we put that on his shutters. 

Close up. 

The shutters do improve the appearance of the house. 

And he also loves fly fishing, so the back shutters have flies and jumping trout. 

Sorry, no pic of the fence. I got too busy and forgot to take a picture. Six foot tall, dog-eared and stained the same as the deck. It’s only a partial fence and ends against a large fir tree. I got cute and cut the last board wiggly to match the shape of the tree trunk to within a half inch.

Redwood Deck

Here’s a really nice deck I did for a good friend. 

The above pic is close to final but there is still a bit of work left. Cable rails, stain on the steps, etc. 

I failed to take any pictures until we were well along. So here is a pic of the stout undercarriage of this deck. I had recently completed a pole barn so this is basically stout enough to hold up a large barn. Or a truck. Or a tank. It has 6x6 pressure treated posts on 8’ centers with double 2x12 girders through bolted. Plus the railings and posts are planted 3’ deep. 

See?  Stout. The first thing I put in is the temporary frame surrounding the deck to show the final dimensions.  After customer OK, I then build the support structure inside it. I spend a lot of time on the alignment of what is essentially a mock up, making sure it is aligned and looks good from every angle. 

You can see it turned out pretty strait. And it lines up perfectly with the existing concrete stairs. 

At this point I spent a bit of time mocking up the built in seats. I thoroughly tested the seat angles for comfort by having every customer and contractor that happened by try out the mockup. Comfortable for tall and short alike, without cushions. 

Here it is, basically done. The seats on the side make it feel very comfortable and protected. I’ve already spent many a summer’s eve playing music and gazing at the stars. And the open end now has cable rails on it that don’t block the view. 

The stairs down to the large back yard. The yard falls away from the house so that the far edge of the deck is a good 4 feet off the ground, so even though the end is open, it feels very protected. The deck does a great job of adding significant living space to a somewhat small house.