Choosing Pressure Treated Decking

Home Remodeling Workshop Decking Tips Hi, I’m Bob Schmidt with Home Remodel Workshop. Our favorite DIY project for you do-it-yourselfers is to build yourself a deck come in the summer and spring. There are a few things you may need to know about flooring material when you’re working with treated wood, the five-quarter variety. I’ll let you know what you need to know, let’s get to work. Although there are compulsive materials available for deck surfaces because of their expense a lot of DIY home owners just go ahead and use the treated wood. When selecting five-quarter boards for your wood deck, the beauty of the wood isn’t exactly what you’re looking for. Even though this grain of wood has a really neat look to it and I’m a wood grain kind of guy, this is not one that I would select for my deck. The reason being is because these vertical grains that goes almost up and down to the deck surface. When you drive a nail in here, this is going to have a tendency to split this wood and every place where you make a cut and you have to nail it in. You’re going to have an issue with these grains wanting to split open. On this piece of wood here, although this has some of the graining features that I like to see in my wood deck. As you can see, when you get over to this and the grain is not centered you can see that the vertical stripes over here again, when you go to nail this side this corner is going to have a tendency to split off. And if we look at the other end of this board, you can see that the grain is more centered on the board. So therefore, what’s going to end up happening is, this side of the board will cup in a consistent rate. The other side won’t, part of it will cup and the other side will want a flare up. So I really would like to see consistent graining on both ends of the board. Now, this is the board that I would want to select for my deck. It has centered graining, nice and even to both sides so that when you’re driving your nail end, it's going to go across these grains. Much less likelihood of splitting and it's almost identical on the other side so I know when it does cup and when it warps which wood does. It's going to do it in a more consistent rate so I don’t have one edge higher than the other. And with the simple water test, you can see what’s going to happen. If you pour the water on this side, you see how the water has a tendency to run off to both sides. That’s exactly what you want to see in a finished flooring board. Where conversely, if you have the grain in the opposite way; when you dump the water on it, it's going to have more of a tendency to run right down in the middle of the board. And what it will do is create a pool in the center of your wood. But you don’t want water sitting on your wood like this on your finished flooring. So, you always make sure that the grain is curve so that it creates a frown on the end before you nail it down. So therefore, there’s always only one right side that goes up on this wood planks. Now, I know what you’re saying. You’re saying if I go to the lumberyard and I go to pick all those stuff out, it could take me hours to find exactly what I need. But keep one thing in mind, your five-quarter decking is probably the single most expensive product that you’re going to put on your deck. Although the framing lumber is not cheap either, there’s just going to be a lot more decking material than there is framing material. So taking your time to protect your investment by buying the proper type of graining, making sure that the upside of the wood is your best side of the wood that your going to put up on your deck is well worth the time. Also, there is a lumberyard or a fabrication place that I’ve been to where they don’t have the sheets that tell you what the wood is treated with and what type of anchors and spacings that should be done with it. Whether it's a galvanized coated nail or galvanized coated bolt, it will give you all the specifications for what you need right here. Now, there are going to be different code restrictions in your area as far as you know what to use with these different types of products. You need to check into that. Make sure that you’re not going to put any bolts or joist hangers or anything that’s going to corrode on your project and lessen the life your deck. Now the hardware that you select while working with your deck is as critical as your deck material itself. This is a hot dipped galvanized through bolt and this is your standard anterior through bolt. Now, other than just the appearance you know once the duller grey galvanized and the other ones as zinc coated, if you use this on certain types of treated lumber, the copper inside the treatment will actually corrode this at a much higher rate and standard. There have been instances on high decks where there’s actually been deck failure because the wrong bolts were used to anchor the deck. Now, there a simple test for when some treated floor is ready to accept finish, sustain or preservative. It’s basically; pour a little bit of water on it. If it soaks out water in, it's ready. It will take the stain or it will take the preservative. Now, I know that there is a tendency that some people will tell you different lengths of time that you need to wait in certain areas before you do it. Now, it's my opinion that if you wait too long and you allow the wood to check and dry out then you’re already fighting a losing battle. Then you’re going to be fighting that from then on and try to keep that wood covered up. So, if you’re going to air on the side of caution, I strongly advise that as soon as moisture looks like it's soaking into the wood and not bitting up on top of it like it did when I first went down. It's time for you to get that deck stain or ceiling on it. Now I know a lot of you do it yourself or just do their work on the weekends but when it comes to your flooring on your decking, there’s a couple of things I’d like to advice. Number one is don’t have it delivered too early to your project and let it sit out in the sun and let it shrink and start to fade and start to dry out prior to putting it all on. If you are going to have it delivered early, I strongly advise you cover it in plastic and put it in a shaded place so that it will shrink and contract at the same rate. If you start putting your decking down and it takes you 3 weeks to get all your decking down, it's very possible that the decking that you put down in the beginning of those three sunny weeks will already be ready to get preservative put on it, to seal it up because of the heat and the dryness. You really want to get this decking all down as close to the same period of time as possible and also the material delivered close to the same amount of time to the same time that you’re going to put your decking with them. So there you go. Make sure you select the graining so that the curve side of the grain is always up and make sure that you install this decking in a timely fashion and stay very well that shortly after you build that deck, you’re going to want to get a treatment on it as soon as possible. Protect your investment when you’re building your deck because they’re no longer inexpensive. This wood is becoming more, more expensive everyday and I think you’ll be fine. I’m Bob Schmidt with Home remodel Workshop. If you like these tips and advice, please subscribe, if not check out our home channel. We have many other videos there, thanks.