uncovered Hardwood Deck

[scraggy]

G'day guys,

Am close to finishing my first project and need some advice.

With all the wet we've had in recent weeks, can I continue to nail the hardwood deck boards without it fully drying out or should I just be patient and wait.

Secondly, I'd started nailing by hand and it seems to be taking rather long...or is it. (I only managed to measure, cut to suit, align with spacers, pre drill then hand nail 35 linear metres of 23mm x 95 mm iron bark decking in one whole day before the rains set in).

Is it advisable to resort to a coil nail gun to speed things up. I'm currently hand nailing using 50 x 2.8 bullet head galv helical nails.

Appreciate any feedback...

scraggy

[Trav]

scraggy

I predrilled and hand nailed 30sq m of decking without needing to resort to a coil nailer. It takes longer, but you don't need to buy or hire a nailer. IMHO the extra $$ aren't worth it unless you are in a real rush.

I think you should wait until it all dries out - be careful about drying the timber in the sun - the boards are likely to warp, causing you more trouble.

Trav

[ctd]

Looking at my hardwood deck after the rain, 2 boards next to each other have become swollen with all the water and have 'popped up', creating a ridge on the deck (admittedly, they were laid a bit too close together so the water was unable to drain away).

If your boards have swollen (due to being wet) and you lay them butted up against each other/with a small gap, conceivably they could shrink .5cm (or maybe more) in width when they dry. If you have 2 next to each other that do that, obviously you end up with a 1cm+ gap.

[scraggy]

G'day Trav & CTD,

Am smiling again now that we have had some glorious days of sunshine. I took advantage of the good weather and am now much much closer to finishng laying the decking boards.

Next stage will be the steps....am thinking about hardwood steps.

Meanwhile thanks for your input.

Cheers,

Scraggy.

[Trav]

Hey scraggy

I made hardwood steps too. I actually made the stringers from treated pine. You will be amazed how big a piece of timber you need to make a lil ol stringer. I reckon I cut more out of the stringer than was left in!

I used 2x4 (or is it 4x2s?) for the treads - two for each step with a decent gap between them. The TP stringers match the TP used for the bearers and joists and the hardwood is the same species as the decking boards. It all came up a treat.

Let me know if you want/need more info.

Trav