Pictures of our new deck

[jinman]

One area of your build we haven't discussed that I was wondering about. Where your new South side deck joins the new East side. Is your plan to extend the ledger on the East side past the house to act as part of the beam for the East side joists? That is what we would do by doubling up the ledger with the last joist on the South side. That is a corner of the house to pay extra attention to the flashing. The extended ledger can act as a path for water to travel back under the flashing at the house.

Mark, on my front deck, the end joists are doubled. I planned to do that for this deck too. That would make that south side deck end at the corner of the house with a double joist. To keep the dimensions true, the ledger would then continue on along this double joist to the south end of the east deck. That would give that area three 2x8s and lots of strength where the two deck sections join. this would be an ideal place for some bolts all the way through. I'm also thinking that to prevent water from running down the ledger and under the flashing, we probably need to make a notch in the ledger so water would drop down and out rather than continuing on down the top of the ledger. It shouldn't take more than a 1" square notch to work as a water trap.

 

[EddieWalker]

I'm not familiar with those structural screws, but like the way they are designed. I really like the large, washer type head, it really makes them look like they will pull the wood together nicely!! They are not something that I've seen before, and I doubt that I'll ever use them. If I'm building something that requires it to hold a load, then I'm going with something that's half in inch thick. I might be wasting money and time on doing it this way, but it's not that much more, and it's guranteed to work.

I don't know if those screws are new technology, or if they've been around forever. I have allot of experience tearing out and throwing away the latest, greatest, technology of the last decade and the decade before that. Trendy and new technology scare me. While a few good products come along, like Hardi, allot are just junk that end up not working. Given a choice, I always go for what's proven over the years.

Simpson sells screws for thier brackets that I prefer over the nails. They are similiar in design to those structural screws that Kenny linked to. I'm sure the nails are fine, but I just hate relying on them when they are so short. They are also a pain to install, and I've gotten to the point where I rarely use a hammer anymore.

Eddie

 

[Bird]

One of my brothers said he learned quite by accident a couple of years ago that Lowe's gives a discount on everything, even small items, to all military personnel, both active and retired.

And, yes, Jim, we'll be looking forward to seeing how the project goes and what it'll look like when finished.

 

[kennyd]

Simpson sells screws for thier brackets that I prefer over the nails. They are similiar in design to those structural screws that Kenny linked to. I'm sure the nails are fine, but I just hate relying on them when they are so short. They are also a pain to install, and I've gotten to the point where I rarely use a hammer anymore.

Eddie

I use the screws also...plus you can reposition the hanger if needed without destroying it.

With all the screwguns, impacts and nailguns in use nowadays, carpenters only carry hammers so people will know they are a carpenter!

 

[jinman]

I'm not familiar with those structural screws, but like the way they are designed. I really like the large, washer type head, it really makes them look like they will pull the wood together nicely!! They are not something that I've seen before, and I doubt that I'll ever use them. If I'm building something that requires it to hold a load, then I'm going with something that's half in inch thick. I might be wasting money and time on doing it this way, but it's not that much more, and it's guranteed to work.

I don't know if those screws are new technology, or if they've been around forever. I have allot of experience tearing out and throwing away the latest, greatest, technology of the last decade and the decade before that. Trendy and new technology scare me. While a few good products come along, like Hardi, allot are just junk that end up not working. Given a choice, I always go for what's proven over the years.

Simpson sells screws for thier brackets that I prefer over the nails. They are similiar in design to those structural screws that Kenny linked to. I'm sure the nails are fine, but I just hate relying on them when they are so short. They are also a pain to install, and I've gotten to the point where I rarely use a hammer anymore.

Simpson's fasteners are their "Strong-Drive" line. I bought four boxes (400 screws) of the SD8x1.25 screws because I saw them on the shelf with the Simpson fasteners right beside the 10d Simpson hot-dipped galvanized nails. So I have screws and nails plus three lengths of deck screws. The ironic thing is that none of these are classified as load bearing except the 10d nails. Do I really want 10d nails holding my joist hangars onto my ledger? I'm not sure. Here is a link to Simpson's data page for thier SDS line of fasteners. I'm starting to think that I should have ordered some of the hex-head structural screws instead of thes wimpy SD8x1.25 screws that I bought. They will work okay for fastening the joist to the hanger bracket, but not for fastening the hangers to the ledger. I'm stuck with 10d nails or the "inappropriate" #8 coated deck screws. I can't help but think the deck screws are the better choice and I'm sure the carpenters would prefer to use them. Decision time... I don't have time to get the correct Simpson fasteners even though I now know which ones I need. My garage is starting to look like a hardware store from all the different fasteners. I can take several of them back if I don't open the packages, so that's probably what I'll do.

I just read on the data sheet that the SD8x1.25 is not appropriate for exterior use at all. Sheesh! They are going back to the store for sure. At $9 for a box of 100, I can't afford to leave them around for "nice to have" items.

 

[EddieWalker]

Eddie, have you been keeping up with the latest "Structural Screws"? There are a few makers of them if you Google the term.

I'm going to look silly here, but it turns out that I've been buying these screws for years now and didn't even know it. McCoys has boxes of them that you buy by the pound. They do this with a variety of screws, including metal roofing screws, Hardi screws for tile, and what I always just considered their heavy duty line of exterior wood screws.

By clicking on the link that Kenny provided, I just learned that McCoys sells them, and by looking at the picture, realized that's what I've been buying.

Try to search function to see who sells them. Here, McCoys is closed on Sunday, but there's probably another company that has them, or you can always go in the morning if you have a McCoys in your area.

I've never heard of the nails failing, I just prefer screws. If you used the nails, it would be just as strong. What we're doing here is splitting hairs, when both will pass any Code around the country. Given the choice, and the way I like to build, is why I use screws.

Eddie

 

[jinman]

Time for an update. . . .

The deck is progressing nicely. It's not going quite as fast as we thought, and will take an additional day to complete. That's largely due to the weather. It has suddenly turned cool and wet. The crew had to knock off a couple of hours early yesterday because of heavy rain.

On Monday, we made some final changes to our plan, adding an additional post on the east side deck. That's a total of 9 posts. I had ordered 9 Simpson post caps, so we had plenty of those. I only had 10 of the 10 ft 6x6 cedar posts, so I was coming up a post short for my deck landing. I also needed one post about 12' long. It turns out that I had a creosote post that is 15' long, so I substituted it.

Here are some pictures of the pad for the landing and the posts. As you can see, the excavation for the pad is also under the corner of the deck and needs a longer post so it can sit on undisturbed soil. After the deck is finished, I plan to add a retaining wall in this area around the pad. The other pictures show the column caps going up and the attachment of the ledger and deck joists. If the weather holds, today we will get the deck and steps finished and tomorrow the handrail.

Oh yes! I posted one additional picture of the ledger board with the lag screws installed.

Edit: It is 6:30 AM and I just looked outside to see about 1-1/2" of snow on the ground with slushy snow falling. Oops! Deck building may have just got very interesting.

 

[Bird]

It's not going quite as fast as we thought, and will take an additional day to complete. That's largely due to the weather. It has suddenly turned cool and wet. The crew had to knock off a couple of hours early yesterday because of heavy rain.

We didn't have any heavy rain yesterday; just very light rain, but the snow and fog this morning are kinda pretty. First snow of the year, and of course could be the only snow of the year.

 

[Western]

jinman,
looking really nice so far can't wait to see it finished.

About a 1/4-1/2" of snow here in South west Wise county, actually feels like winter for a change.

 

[jinman]

The snow was much deeper about an hour ago, but there is still plenty of slushy messy stuff to make building a pain. I haven't seen the framers this morning and suspect they may wait awhile before showing up.

...I know, I know... you guys up north are laughing your hineys off at us. We are such cold weather wimps.

Like Bird said, this may be the only snow we actually see all winter long. We have to make a big deal of it when we get the chance.