Decking material?

[Ole Anderson]

I installed Trex years ago before they recognized the mildew issues with their formula. I power wash every year, but it looks far from new and even with a recommended deck cleaner, you can still see the mildew issue as the surface becomes quite soft. Later I installed a deck in a different part of the yard and used composite with a solid plastic skin. That is a much improved product. Still needs power washing every year, but it cleans up much nicer than the original Trex. And power washing got much easier when I bought a $75 14" diameter Briggs and Stratton rotary surface cleaner attachment. https://www.amazon.com/Briggs-Stratt...urface+cleaner

[Eric D Matson]

Has anyone used Super Shield to seal their hardwood?

http://www.ipe-deck.com/SuperShield/

[John TenEyck]

Eric, no I haven't used or even heard of Super Shield, but I would not use a film finish on my deck. If it lasted 20 years with no required maintenance that would be great, but every film finish I've ever seen used on outdoor wood gets cracks and/or UV degradation after 4 or 5 years, and usually less, and when that happens water gets in and starts to lift the finish, turn the underlying wood black, etc., and then you are in for a big maintenance job. So I'm sticking with oils. It lasts only a few months on horizontal surfaces, more than a year on vertical ones, but never peels or cracks so maintenance is easy - clean, recoat, done. Really, it's not much work. My deck is roughly half a 22 ft circle with planters and seats and steps. It takes less than two hours to clean, and two to three hours more to apply a new coat of oil a couple of days later. Now if it ever stops raining long enough here I might get it done.

I was using Ipe' Oil from DeckWise, but I'm trying Penofin Hardwood oil this year to see if it lasts longer: https://thestaindepot.com/product/penofin-hardwood-stain/
I bought a 5 gal pail of it so that will be enough to do the deck at least twice.

And whoever said to use Cumaru, I agree. The verticals on my deck skirt and planter boxes are Cumaru. It's as good looking as Ipe' IMO and costs a lot less. It will only last 30 years or so with no maintenance, but a lot longer if you oil it, which is good enough for most applications. When I bought the Ipe' for my deck it was no more expensive than the high end plastic decking. Cumaru was about half the price of Ipe'.

If anyone decides to go with Ipe' or one of the other tropical hardwoods be aware that it's not really dry when you get it. I bought mine from Advantage Lumber, and have nothing but good to say about the product and service I got. But their directions say to let the wood acclimate, stickered, for two weeks prior to using it. I let mine sit for 3 - 4 weeks, and still had significant shrinkage. That is the one thing that bugs me about my deck; the gaps between the boards are larger than I would like. I would recommend you wait a lot longer before using it. Of course, checking it with a moisture meter would be the smart thing to do which I didn't and have been kicking myself ever since.

John

[Rich Enders]

Mel,

The composite decking in the photo is from Fiberon and it is their Horizon line. Available at Home Depot. I saw an add over the week-end at $2.25/lf.

[David Sloan]

I installed Trex years ago before they recognized the mildew issues with their formula. I power wash every year, but it looks far from new and even with a recommended deck cleaner, you can still see the mildew issue as the surface becomes quite soft. Later I installed a deck in a different part of the yard and used composite with a solid plastic skin. That is a much improved product. Still needs power washing every year, but it cleans up much nicer than the original Trex. And power washing got much easier when I bought a $75 14" diameter Briggs and Stratton rotary surface cleaner attachment. https://www.amazon.com/Briggs-Stratt...urface+cleaner

I labored for a long time building a multilevel deck at our old home. It was Trex original and boy did I have a miserable time scrubbing it 3 times a year. Mildew and mold was awful and nothing ever really worked. If we had stayed in that house I would have had to take it all apart and redo the deck with something else. I know the new products are much better.

[Jeff Duncan]

I'm trying to decide myself but only for the back stairs. I was leaning heavily towards the artificial stuff as I really don't need any more things to maintain at home when a google search yielded a lot of negative comments on Trex and similar products. Trex actually had a huge class action lawsuit against it do to its products not living up to what was promised. Not sure if the others did as well, but many certainly had similar problems. I replaced the boards on a large deck about ten years ago with a competitor and it looks like crap. Now these companies are all selling a "New and Improved" version which has supposedly solved all the problems of the past. Maybe it has, but of course we won't really know for a couple decades. So I'm still not totally sure but leaning heavily towards Ipe. It's just such a gorgeous wood and wears like steel, I'm just not looking forward to another thing I have to maintain every year! I think I'll compromise and do the risers out of Azek

good luck,
JeffD

[John TenEyck]

Jeff, with my Ipe' deck the maintenance prep. work is mostly on the horizontal surfaces; vertically oriented boards don't get much sun bleaching or build up of dirt, etc. I just spent this afternoon prepping my deck for a fresh oiling. For whatever reason, there was a large buildup of what looked like a dirty film, much more so than last year, and the cleaner I used this year didn't do a very good job of removing it. I ended up having to pressure wash it to get it off. Looks great now, but I'm going to go back to the Olympic Deck cleaner/brightner I used last year. It cleaned it lickety split. Anyway, 90% of the effort went into the horizontal boards. There wasn't much cleaning needed on the riser, skirt boards, etc. You would save on the need to apply oil to them if you used Azek risers, but oiling the whole deck doesn't take that long; I'm not sure the time saved would amount to much.

John

[Lee Schierer]

I used Veranda Decking by Home Depot 15 years ago to redo our decks. They get power washed once a year to remove the winter algae growth and they still look like new. I even made the picnic table surface and seats for the stools with veranda tops and they also are holding up very well. The light color of the material on the tables and stools shows the dirt a little more readily than the red colored deck does.
backdeck.jpg
deck1.jpg

[Brian Holcombe]

I've had a great experience with Ipe, same as John. Composite...not so much. On my father's deck which gets afternoon sun, Ipe has held up wonderfully where composite failed.

I wear dress shoes pretty regularly and I never have problems on a wood deck, but I've nearly killed myself on a few of my neighbor's plastic decks, the material just does not seem to grab leather soled shoes at all.

[Brian W Evans]

Prompted by this thread, I've looked into Ipe and Cumaru decking. One web site suggested that these woods were strong enough that 1x (.75") material should be used for the deck surface instead of the 5/4 stuff you usually find on decks.

I also read that, when using hidden fasteners, you should use 4" wide stock instead of 6".

Any thoughts on either of these?

[John TenEyck]

Brian, personally, I would stick with the 5/4 decking, whether Ipe' or any other hardwood. The actual thickness is 1". If I were to do it over again, I would use the 4" wide stock instead of the 6" (5-1/2" real width). As I mentioned earlier, I had more shrinkage than expected and the narrower stock would have less. It's also cheaper.

John

[Jeff Duncan]

Jeff, with my Ipe' deck the maintenance prep. work is mostly on the horizontal surfaces; vertically oriented boards don't get much sun bleaching or build up of dirt, etc. I just spent this afternoon prepping my deck for a fresh oiling. For whatever reason, there was a large buildup of what looked like a dirty film, much more so than last year, and the cleaner I used this year didn't do a very good job of removing it. I ended up having to pressure wash it to get it off. Looks great now, but I'm going to go back to the Olympic Deck cleaner/brightner I used last year. It cleaned it lickety split. Anyway, 90% of the effort went into the horizontal boards. There wasn't much cleaning needed on the riser, skirt boards, etc. You would save on the need to apply oil to them if you used Azek risers, but oiling the whole deck doesn't take that long; I'm not sure the time saved would amount to much.

John

Thanks John, good information! I'm not using Ipe for the risers, wouldn't look right on my house. They're going to be painted white. And having spent an inordinate time looking at neighbors front porches the last couple weeks I've noticed painted risers tend to look pretty rough, even on newer porches! I think using the Azek and leaving it white should help in this regard.

Jeff

[keith micinski]

I know the newer composite products have gotten better with fading but I'm not sure how they are much less maintanece then even a pressure treated deck. They need power washed every spring because they still get mildew and staining on them. They still fade and break down over time from the sunlight and even new they still look like the paneling equivalent of decking. I would have a hard time choosing composite over pressure treated if they were the same price let alone 6 times as much. Plus the biggest project and most expensive project on a deck is usually the railing and the composite railing systems are an absolute joke.

[Robert Engel]

After "upgrading" an existing deck to composite, I'm convinced the joists should be on 12" centers.