Let’s build a deck!
The materials you used to build the deck
- wood
- Nails
- opinion
- String line
- nailer
- Wood bar
- Wood pro wood
How did you choose the material for your deck?
I personally chose Pro-wood For all my pressure therapist. needs. Not only are they of very high standards, they are also used in the latest technology called MCA where the C stands for copper. I like this because this means it is not harmful to plants, people or pets. But it is harmful to microbes that cause mold or fungi. Treated wood comes in levels of treatment, so choosing a wood can be difficult, but Pro-wood has black finish markings that make it easy. Whether you need light duty, ground connection, or something else.
Step 1: Set up the deck posts
Let’s start by showing you the previous shot. Everything here was in pretty good shape other than the stairs but I’ll talk about that later so all I did was remove the railing and refinish what was there so I could start building on it. The frame of any deck consists of four main components: columns, beams, joists, and the deck plate. We start by setting the posts. Different areas will have different depth requirements for how deep you should dig your hole, so be sure to check your code before starting.
I then wear a mail-keeping sleeve. I don’t put a post in the ground without one of these guys. What you need to create rot on the pole is moisture and air, and the place most susceptible to rot is about two inches above ground level. The line here indicates that this is two inches above ground level and this will protect this area that is most susceptible to rot.
Its interior is lined with a tar-like feature that creates a water- and air-tight seal to prevent oxygen from reaching the column. The wrap takes heat to shrink to its perfect size. I used my propane torch while someone else ran it. It only takes a few seconds, and then I cool it down using a roller dipped in water.
Step Two: Pour concrete to secure the columns
If you have a big job like this, I personally think it’s worth renting a mixer so you can do three bags at a time. Remember to slope the concrete away. You don’t want to create an area where more water can collect.
Let me give you a tip about using a string line to designate a post. A lot of times when you see people pulling a line from the chain, they pull it out and then try to set up the post right next to it, and the problem is that if you end up putting too much pressure on it even visibly with one post, the chain will get out of alignment. What I recommend instead is to move the string line away from it, in this case it will be 18 inches, so that whenever you set the post, you can then pull out your tape measure, adjust the tape, and press to that mark.
Okay, so the posts are all set, let’s move on to cutting them to height so we can set the beams.
Step 3: Cut the posts to height
So this line comes from using a laser level on all posts. Once you have the face marker, you can now translate that using the speed square. My favorite speed square on the site is this Crescent which not only starts at 6 inches, but has a very fast ruler that folds down to 12 inches.
For all the tires I use Pressure treated wood from Pro Woods Especially for the post where I use their tag that says “For the Earth”. I’ll tell you more about their stressful journalism later. Jacob now goes through and marks all the shoulder positions. These heads will be attached to an actual shoulder so that they rest on a bump on these beams, so he just uses the square of the velocity to determine the depth.
The thing about making these shoulders is that the circular saw won’t have enough throw to do it all at once. You can use the circular saw and set the depth in order to cut this face to where it doesn’t go beyond your shoulder, in our case it could be the full depth without going over but then make all the cuts here and while Jake’s doing that, I’ll go back and finish it with the saw. This concludes the cut at both shoulders. The next thing is to cut all the beams to length to put on the shoulders.
Step 4: Prepare the packages
It’s already crowned, you can go through your board and crown it, and then when you find where the curve is, you put an arrow on it, so whenever you set it in pkae, you can make sure it’s facing up. This one will go halfway through this post. I’ll come back with the screws but for now I’m just going to install a stud.
For the battens I use double 2 x 12’s. You want these boards to be as unbonded as possible for strength, which means sucking them together. I first used a three-inch power lag to pull the cup out and then went back with a nailer to secure it all the way through. This was my first job using a Senco nailer and I was very impressed with how quickly it fired.
At the end of putting all the packages in place, it looks a little like this.
Step 5: Install the joists
The next step is to adjust the lever. You often see joists that are placed in hangers and screwed to the face of the beam, but in this case they will be screwed on top which means first I need to go through the top of the beam and flatten them. A chalk line is useful for giving a clear view of high spots. I then used an electric planer to level the top. Since the work site was sloped, the lower beam was pretty easy, and the middle section as a shoulder exercise, but the far beam was much higher than my head.
Tip: If you don’t have a planer, another option is to use a fence or circular saw to make the top completely flat
Step 6: Prepare the joists
Let’s start with the third major framing component: the crane setup. First, I ended up exposing the rim joist that was here so we could access the joist from the existing deck and sister on these boards to them instead of using the joist hangers on the rim joists. By doing it this way, we don’t have to cut the height of each board, we just let it flow down there, but we have to drill it out to get a 2 x 10 made up of 2 x 8’s. On the other hand, Jacob placed it directly on top of it and this should come out level.
When you decide how many joists you want, you can do either 24-inch centers, or 16-inch centers, and you can play with doing 2 x 8s or 2 x 10s. In fact, with the 2 x 8s and 2 x 10s, I could have gone with 24-inch centers, but I made the decision to use 16-inch ones so as not to make it look too squishy. The cost is very low so I recommend sticking with 16 seconds.
The complication here is making sure that what we’re doing goes square on the other surface, so we’re going to go to the last surface so we can then pull out the diagonals and make sure that the structure we’re putting in is square. So, at the beams, I would have to secure my toenail to the joist.
Tip: Take the tip of your nail gun off, this is really good when you’re in bump position or nailing flat, but if you’re going to nail your nails and you’re going to take this off, they give you the nails to go in at an angle without moving on you.
The two measurements I’m really interested in here is that these tails are quite spaced apart from each other and so they’re 16 in the middle.
Step 7: Day 2! Finish adjusting the lever by spacing them evenly
So, when setting up the joist, in the last step, you should attach an edge joist that connects the tails of each one. It is important that the overhang of each joist is as close to each other as possible. So when you measure these 16 in the middle, you never want to go from the top because it’s not pinned there, so you want to go from the bottom and what I love about this tape is that it has numbers on both sides which makes measuring from the bottom very simple.
Step 8: Register the crane
Before doing anything else I want to tighten the joist which will greatly extend the life of the panels. The tricky thing about my particular situation is that the ground is so uneven that I would have to move the ladder five or six times for each joist, to prevent that I ended up doing a kind of jumping frog activity where I used two 2 x 8’s as benches and then swapped them around a bit while coming back with four or five pieces of tape at a time. I would lead the first two feet, move my board back and then move my board back and advance the next two feet until I reached the end.
Now on this joist tape, you want to wrap it around the end and cover the end grain where the wood will actually absorb the moisture.
Step 9: Complete the deck frame by adding a rim riser
While Cindy and I were dealing with the jack bar, Jacob was finishing the last of the framing members for the pool. This is the only part of the deck that has transom hangers. That’s why we use a Senco Nailer designed specifically for hanging joists.
The last thing we do to finish the framing is put in the edge joist. This is the plate that will connect all the crane tails together. Another important thing is that it does the lifting. With a crane, you always start with the board at one end and progress to the other end of the crane one at a time. As you move forward, one person has to make sure that the top of the rim joist is not only flush with the top of the joist but also that the joist is also at the ninety degree so that it can be nailed at the top and bottom. It is easier with two people on this task.
I check the speed box to make sure it is flush and will push or pull it if it is not. If the lever is crooked, I use a crescent hammer with a spur on it to grab the lever and use leverage to twist it straight while telling Jacob “up” so he knows he can stick it.
Deck framing is completed!
This concludes the first video of the deck series. I really hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed building it. But follow me because I have a lot of deck to build and I will take you along for the ride. In the meantime, feel free to check out my website for lots of project plans and templates. Until next time!
