deck bearers with no space

[energyfreak]

Hi all
I am building a deck which is at floor level which is only 200mm above the footing beam. The houose is on a pad which slopes off fairly steeply (900mm in 4 metres) away from the house.

I can't use a ledger attached to the house because the ledger would be only a few mm above soil level, and if I dig away the soil to give the the required clearance, the footing beam would be almost undermined.

We also live in a termite area.

I understand that if i separate the deck from the house by 40 mm, I can use systems other than a ledger to mount the joists.

The second and third bearer line will be well above groundlevel, so it's only the house end that is a problem.

One idea is to sit a bearer directly on the surface with plastic beneath it to reduce termite issues. Perhaps with a layer of termite gravel beneath.

Another possibility is to use a steel I beam as bearer with an ant cap on top; the beam sitting on some concrete pads.

Any ideas or sources of info?
cheers
Richard

[OBBob]

Could you make a sort of strip fotting along the house end and build off that?

[Yonnee]

I had the same problem. I dyna bolted a ledger beam to the wall at joist height, and then used pryda joist hangers to attach the joists to that first beam. The joists are then sitting on top of the bearers the second, third and fourth rows out.

Hope this helps.

Yonnee.