If you can't find it, design it !
by Jamie Martin
(Middle Sackville NS)
It all began about a month ago when I started looking for ideas for a deck. I had an idea of what I wanted but could not find that perfect deck, and then I came across your site and realized that the only way I was going to get the deck I wanted was to design it myself.
After a few drawings and some discussion with my wife this is what I came up with. Of course she did not see the big picture at first but new that she would like it if I was designing it. Having built only one deck prior to this I wanted to make sure I did my homework on code and having enough support to hold such a big deck. Once this was determined I was fortunate enough to have a brother-in-law that was a surveyor and was kind enough to come by and give me my post lengths in style with the state of the art gear.
Once my carriers and stringers were in place I wanted to cover up the nails so I used 1x8 board all around the outside and glued it on with the odd finish nail. Then it came time to put on the covering.
Not sure if any of you have ever put deck boards on this way but if you are about to give yourself extra time and cost for materials. I started out by placing a boarder all around the perimeter then I got the idea of putting in an interior boarder to kind of set a place for a table. Well what I never thought of was the fact that I needed to have wood on each side of the border to nail my angled boards, so I ended up having to fake in pieces in between each stringer and run a long piece down the side of a stringer.
That’s when I realized I would have to do this for all the interior of the exterior boarder, by now I was so far into it with time that I carried on in hope that I would appreciate it when it was done. I was not let down upon completion of the lower deck. (Before I continue I have to say that the higher of the 2 is a 10 by 12 deck which came with the house).
After finishing the lower one I realized that it did not square up with my border as I would have liked it to. So after stripping off the existing rails and deck boards, which was a part of my plan, I had to take off the outer piece of 2 by 8 and square up the existing deck to the border of the new deck. To do this I ran a string line across and nailed in pieces from the side of the existing stringers out to the new piece of 2 x 8. I then covered it over, putting the angle the same as the table setting section, with the rest of the deck running the opposite way.
Once the deck was covered then came the privacy wall along the back section of the deck (my wife had wanted a section of lattice across the top). I didn’t like what the hardware store sold, so I came up with something that would work to my liking. I took a piece of 2x4 and ripped out a section which left me with an L shape piece which worked out great. I placed it down over my screws on the wall covering and ran it half way into the top piece of 2x4 for the wall, then butted my lattice to that and put the piece that came off the 2x4 in behind to secure the lattice in place.
For the top I ran into the same problem, so I took a piece of 2x6 and ripped out the inside leaving me with the same L shape as the bottom. Except this time I had enough top to cover my post and again used the wastage of that to go up inside of the piece to hold the lattice tight, and did the same on the back side. This proved to be very nice in hiding all screws and ends.
Next came the pergola. Having never built one before I wanted it to be unique, so I designed it to come in on an angle to give the stringers some style, if you will. One problem I ran into with this was that with my post being offset when I went to put on my 2x8 I noticed that it stuck off a little too much. I ended up cutting off the outer edge of the post to accommodate the post in sitting flush. As well as giving it some support, this turned out quite a nice feature.
For the steps I was going to do something different but after some research and discussion with different builders they advised I stick with the standard for the fact that people are not use to steps being outside the norm of 11 inches and may trip more on a wider step than any other.
So this is my story and a few issues I ran into while building my deck. In the end I am extremely pleased with the outcome and it has been the envy of the neighbourhood. Hope it makes your cut.
Click here to read or post comments.