New cedar deck in Southfield Mi

Here is a project we completed about a month ago

We started by tearing out a old treated pine deck

that was very old and out of code

The new deck is all cedar, 2x6 deck boards, with our typical builders rail with metal balusters, and cedar lattice.

We stained the deck after we completed the building portion. This is a benefit of choosing cedar for your deck, It can and should be stained right away. It is also a much more stable wood than treated pine ( It does not shrink very much).

In this picture you can see the 2x6 decking running on a 45 degree angle, framing is 16" on center with the 2x6 decking. You can also see the border board at the top of the steps, which overlaps the tiered fascia.

On this side of the deck there is a little bay area bump out for a grill Typical builders rail - 2x4 top and bottom rails, attached to the rail posts with a pocket hole attachment with a 2x6 deck board - cap board that is routered with a 1/2 round over bit.

On this side of the deck, the angle follows the driveway.

Another view of the bump out bay

Decking again running on a 45 degree angle.

All done

Thank You .. for reading our blog

Stamped and stained concrete

It has been awhile since I have updated this blog. My computer's video card crashed twice and Dell computer replaced my old computer with a new one, but it took awhile to get the new computer and to get everything transfered over from the old computer. Thank you Dell for the new computer Anyways back to the topic... Works has been a little slow. But we have been busy also Since we last updated we had just finished a Correct Deck CX composite deck. From that job we went onto to a stamped concrete job. The project was to remove a portion of a asphalt driveway that had been settling and replace with stamped concrete.

The interesting thing with this project was the settling issue we decided to dig down under the driveway to see what was going on to cause this collapsing of the driveway.

We end up digging out 15 tons of buried garbage ! There was 4 or 5 old hot water tanks, a washer, a complete rear end of a car with tires, a complete car engine and alot of metal debris.

We ended up filling a 30 yards dumpster with trash from under this driveway.

The color did not come out to good in these photo's

But we did a beige integral color with a charcoal release color. Then we stained the border a light brown and colored a few bricks in the stamped pattern to give some highlight the job turned out awesome looking and all the water issue they had were fixed. The concrete passed a big test a couple of weeks ago when we got about 7 inches of rain and it all ran off and there was no settling !

Here are a few better pictures of stained and stamped concrete. These pictures are from my father in-laws shop. The Dutch Mill.

Here you have a 8" textured border in a dark colored stain with a inside random stone stamp patern with different colored stained rocks

Here you have a brick border stained in a lighter color, inside the border there is a random stone stamp with every stone stain in different colors

We have also completed a couple of deck since the last update so I will update those project this week also Thank You for reading

Next Project 10 x 16 Correct Deck CX Composite in Auburn Hills MI

On this project we tore off the old decking and railings.

The frame was still good, sorry I forgot to take before pictures

Here is the design picture

The deck is Correct Deck CX composite. It has a single picture frame border, DCL railing, fascia, treads, and risers in Mahogany color, and the decking is in Pebble with Pebble lattice.

The DCL railing has Deckorators round metal balusters

In the picture below - I would like to point out the squash blocks under the center of the 2x4 DCL rail.

You would be surprised how many decks I have seen without the squash blocks installed.

Every railing I have seen without the squash blocks have sagged pretty bad.

Something so simply makes a big difference

Thank You

Our Next Project: A small pressure treated deck in Rochester Hills MI

Here is what have been building the last couple of days. A 7x20 treated pine deck with 1 foot cut corners, and 2 steps. We also built a small privacy fence at the end of the deck

Here is the design

Here is what it came out like

Privacy fence,

Treated pine 4x4 posts, 2x4 rails, 2x2 top section with cedar tongue and groove solid panels,

Next we are going to Auburn Hills to build a Correct Deck CX deck

What we did today... Vinyl Pergola

Today we built a vinyl pergola kit from Backyard America,

The model is called "The Aspen" and it's main feature: is it's curved rafters.

We built it for a display / give away for Lumber Jack Building Center in Algonac MI. They are going to give it away for there 45 anniversary of being in business.

We augered 8" x 42" holes into the ground to bury 4x4s to support the pergola posts.

The kits are pretty easy to install, it took us about 6 hours to build, with the shade screens

Shade screens, They slide into a vinyl H-channel

The pergola kits look nice with a landscape block retaining wall built up around the base of the posts. You can also use round columns for the main posts. There is also options of staight rafters, Fabric awnings attached to the pergola, and shade blinds, and privacy fences

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Here are a few pictures of the options for the pergolas from Backyard America

Round Columns with straight rafters

Drop down fabric blinds Fabric shade awnings attached to the pergola

Custom Pergolas

Thank You

We are off to Rochester Hills to build a small pressure treated pine deck

Here is some final pictures from this job. To review, we were only going to replace the railings on this job. But once we tore out the railings and fascia we noticed the rot damage to the deck boards. So we ended up replacing all the decking and re-building all the steps.

The deck boards are 2x6 cedar. The railing posts are 4x4 treated pine and rails are 2x4 treated pine with the classic deckorators metal balusters. We capped the top rail with a cedar 2x6 and we routered the 2x6 top cap

Center seam board

Thank You... Coming up we have a Vinyl Pergola to build. A small treated pine deck, and another Correct Deck Cx composite job to do... Look out for some updates

A few thoughts on deck building, and our next project in Rochester Hills MI

Our next project is a re-cover and new railings on a multi-level deck in Rochester Hills MI

When we get into tearing apart an old deck it gives us alot of good insight of deck construction failures or problem areas. One area I see alot of problems from is when two pieces of wood are sandwiched or sistered together and water can run in-between the two pieces of wood.

On this deck we are working on was a old cedar deck with a treated pine frame. To cover the treated frame they used a single 1x fascia board this typical in cedar and composite/pvc deck building, but is a sure problem area down the road. This deck is about 15 to 20 years old and it is easy to see why you do not do this. The gap between the fascia and the end grain of the deck boards created a perfect place for debris and water to build up and promote rot.

Fascia Boards: Stepped and single fascia boards where they cover the rim joist of a deck. In the picture below, we started by taking off the railings and fascia boards. If you notice the fascia board that is removed from the angled portion of this deck and you can see where we have not removed the fascia board yet. The fascia is covering the end grains of the deck boards and the treated frame. But what it is really doing is creating a space for water and debris to collect and rot away at the end grains of the deck boards and eventually the fascia.

You can see the treated pine frame is not rotted just the ends of the deck boards the fasia is rotted too. Another problem that results from this is carpenter ants and carpenter bees. They seem to feed off of the rotted area, we had to remove a couple of large nests from this deck

This is easally prevent by running a border board around the outside of the deck or running the ends of the deck boards over the rim joist. We prefer the border board method because it hides the end grains of the deck boards. It does require more framing for the border picture frame but it is also a nice design feature. See in the picture below how this works

On this deck we have a 2 tiered fascia covering the outside rim joist. But notice the border board hides the end grain of the deck boards and covers the sandwiched or sistered 2 tiered fascia no water or debris can get into the sanwiched area

From above the view of a picture frame border

Border board on a composite deck where it really sets a nice design feature