What to put on deck

[Midpack]

OK... here are the pics


Wow... do not know how to attach properly...

There is a pic of the deck I have not cleaned... the whole deck looked like this or worse...

A pic of the section I have cleaned...

And a pick of the top left part of the pic up close to show the surface cracks....

Looks just like my deck, so I share the dilemma. Our deck is 28 years old FWIW.

 

[MichaelB]

Consumer Reports has written a lot on decks and staining. 10 years ago they wrote that there wasn't a stain on the market that lasted more than 3 years. Now they seem to like a few products. A snippet from their latest report.

Washing and sanding are typical first steps to staining a deck. But as mentioned above, remember that sanding a wood deck treated with chromated copper arsenate (CCA) releases toxic arsenic into the air and surrounding soil. Call a pro if your deck was built before 2004 and its finish is flaking. If you'll be pressure-washing a newer wood deck, read instructions before starting and cover adjacent landscaping with plastic sheeting. The pressure needed is typically 1,500 PSI; a wide-angle spray tip of 25 to 40 degrees creates a relatively wide spray that protects the wood. Angle the spray and keep it between 6 and 12 inches away from wood surfaces.

They go on to break down the product offerings into 3 categories of wood treatment: solid stain, semitransparent, and clear. Solid is like paint, clear shows all the natural wood grain. The solid can last years but after a couple of coats the paint starts to peel and chip. As you move toward clear you show much more of the wood beauty but need to refinish much more frequently, probably every year or two.

 

[Free To Canoe]

I have 4 painted decks that came with the house. I have been repainting this last few weeks. Seems like it would be just as much work to stain as to paint? Paint on the horizontal is lasting 2-5 years, depending on the method and traffic.

Composite decking would be nice but I think to do it all, it would cost more than our house does.

Winter as well as sun takes its toll on the paint.

 

[Texas Proud]

I have 4 painted decks that came with the house. I have been repainting this last few weeks. Seems like it would be just as much work to stain as to paint? Paint on the horizontal is lasting 2-5 years, depending on the method and traffic.

Composite decking would be nice but I think to do it all, it would cost more than our house does.

Winter as well as sun takes its toll on the paint.

I still have to look some more, but I keep reading about sealant that all you do it spray it on... if that is the case, then much easier than stain or paint... and I could do that every 2 or 3 years....

 

[JDARNELL]

I have. Deck that is rough so I cleaned it and used a Bauer product I got at Home Depot. It went on like pudding. Finish is amazing. I was shocked


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[FreeBear]

Our friend's deck is 20 yrs old and looked perhaps worse than yours. We applied "Behr premium solid color weather proofing wood stain" since a neighbor recommended it. He does a re-coat every couple of years. We applied 2 coats, using a deck pad where possible to speed the process. Horizontal surfaces went surprisingly quickly. You could probably single coat the area in you picture an hour. The railing spindles were a pain, as mentioned earlier.

The final result looks incredible, almost like paint, since the "solid color" pigment is so thick. We didn't do anything to prep the the deck before applying stain (no power wash or chemical prep); we'll see if we regret this later.

 

[Amethyst]

Sorry - I meant to say Behr Deckover in my post, not Deck Restore (which is the Rustoleum product - I used their 10X on our concrete walkway - it was like painting with thick vanilla frosting but we love the way it looks now ).

Because the boards themselves are weathered, the wood grain is still fairly apparent even through the 4X Deckover. However, I read somewhere that younger people are so used to manmade deck materials that they don't even like woodgrain. So, if you are looking to sell the home, lack of wood grain may even be to your advantage!

Amethyst

We went with the Behr Deckover product from Home Depot. The deckover stuff is thick and you pretty much lose all the wood grain

 

[pb4uski]

I have. Deck that is rough so I cleaned it and used a Bauer product I got at Home Depot. It went on like pudding. Finish is amazing. I was shocked....

I'm just wondering how that product will hold up and look in a year or two. If it holds up well, it is well worth the cost and effort, but I'm skeptical.

Also, we clear snow off our deck during the winter which adds to the wear and tear.

 

[Bamaman]

I've got a 10' x 30' deck that looks pretty bad, and I've been considering the Behr 4x product. It's not a very expensive product overall, and if it lasted 2 years it'd not be too bad to clean and resurface the deck.

I built another deck out of Trex. The trick to Trex is to pressure wash it a couple of times per year. My pressure washer has just been fixed, and I plan to clean it shortly. Even with a chemical cleaner, my Trex doesn't even look that good--for the money spent.

If I was building another deck, I think I'd just be going with #1 pressure treated pine--the best quality available. The wood deck mentioned above is #2 and it's just not held up very well. Cedar and other woods are just too expensive, especially when you're building a very large deck. Sometimes it's just as cheap to do concrete if you're on ground level.

 

[REWahoo]

I'm just wondering how that product will hold up and look in a year or two.

+1

If you search on "deck restore" on YouTube it brings up far too many 'deck disaster' titles for my comfort.

 

[NW-Bound]

The deck of my high-country home is 10-year old. It was originally stained the same color as the house with a penetrating oil stain. Then, it started to fade after 1 year. This should be expected, and the stain was to be reapplied. However, the builder in honoring the warranty reapplied the stain with a different brand. This was a thicker type that coated more like a paint, and the wood was completely covered. It looked good, but started to wear out after 3 years. So, we reapplied the same type once more.

At the 7th year, disaster struck. The paint layer started peeling off. It looked awful. Yet, in places it still stuck well enough that a pressure washer could not get it off. So the deck now looks blotchy.

By researching and talking to the locals, I learned that the stain to use is a penetrating type with linseed oil. And I would not use the original brand that was used. Its rating was not that good. If I were to do it all over again, I would demand that the boards were stained on all sides, not just the top surface after they got installed.

So now, I just applied the stain to the spots where the paint has peeled. Hopefully with time, in another year or two and the old layer completely peels off, the whole surface will look uniform again.

When I redo the deck it is going to be composite. With a 1000 sq.ft. deck, it is going to cost a bit of money. A composite deck does hold the heat, but that is not a problem at 7000 ft elevation.

 

[REWahoo]

Once my new deck starts looking bad I may go with outdoor carpeting. Cool underfoot, no cracking, peeling or splinters, uniform color and no need to reapply every year or two.

 

[Amethyst]

Perhaps they took too literally, the videos showing people effortlessly applying the product from a standing position with no preparation, and then dancing barefoot on the finish? Or heaven forbid...attempting to SPRAY the product? (Picture thick liquid substance hitting a rotating fan)

+1

If you search on "deck restore" on YouTube it brings up far too many 'deck disaster' titles for my comfort.

 

[NW-Bound]

In my case, there is a real reason for the deck. No concrete, brick, or carpet, as the deck is as high as 8 ft off the ground because the house is on a ridge. I own 1/2 or maybe 1/3 of a hill.

 

[REWahoo]

Perhaps they took too literally, the videos showing people effortlessly applying the product from a standing position with no preparation, and then dancing barefoot on the finish? Or heaven forbid...attempting to SPRAY the product? (Picture thick liquid substance hitting a rotating fan)

I only looked at a couple of them but both claimed to have carefully followed the directions for preparation and application. Who really knows...

 

[target2019]

I was going to post a question about deck treatment, as ours is getting tired after at least 10 years of exposure to the NE US weather.

I redid the the upper green deck before the treatment. I used 2x6 pressure treated pine. After a year or two I bought a large container of something like BEHR PREMIUM Semi-Transparent Weatherproofing All-In-One Wood Stain & Sealer previously mentioned. I still have the can, and mine also mentions alkyd and acrylic in the name. A 5-gallon can did everything twice. Some sections held up better. Also, for about 5 years there were two very large trees growing through the deck, providing a lot of shade from the intense sun. You can see the sun has washed out the picture completely at the right.

I will probably go searching for the same Wehr product, or similar, for the upper green deck. I have found that a couple of gallons of deck wash, and a light power scrub, cleans the surface very well.

The lower red decks are 2x4's, and a lot of those need to be replaced. I found that the red non-Wehr product did not hold up as well. I will probably also use a Wehr product for that portion.

I looked at online reviews of the newer products, and too many are negative. So I'm being really cautious, as I do not want to redo any of this work, which is costly and time-consuming.

 

[Texas Proud]

Perhaps they took too literally, the videos showing people effortlessly applying the product from a standing position with no preparation, and then dancing barefoot on the finish? Or heaven forbid...attempting to SPRAY the product? (Picture thick liquid substance hitting a rotating fan)

The deck restore 4X or 10X cannot be sprayed.... but there are deck sealers that can...

As others have mentioned... who knows if they did it correctly... but I did see one video where the guy showed how he did it and it looked like it was better than what most would do... filled in the cracks, brushed the edge of every board before using a flat something to brush the planks.... he then had problems I think in a year or two.... flaking off etc....

One guy had ripples on the deck.... like it did not stick to the wood at all... so you know they are going to crack....


Right now I think I am going to go with the water seal... I can live with doing it every 2 or 3 years (even though we have lived here 5 years and this is the first time I am getting to it )....

 

[tryan]

Don't bother with the Behr Deckover. Used it at the lake .... married the color and now it peels up in SHEETS .... every year. What a waste of time. Forget I followed the instructions to a tee.

Now I am faced with popping the boards and flipping them to get back to what I started with. What a MESS!

 

[ERD50]

...

I'd love to hear about a better solution though.

Masonry products. Natural or man-formed. Many styles available.

We did our patio area in cement patio pavers. A random pattern of 3x6, 6x6, and 6x9 pavers. Looks great, almost no maintenance (a little weed pulling/spraying, a little sand spread in the cracks maybe once a year).

Might be too hot for full sun in the South, ours gets some shade from trees, and the house blocks the afternoon sun.

-ERD50

 

[REWahoo]

Like NW, our deck is elevated. Masonry isn't an option.

 

[pb4uski]

+1, 7' off the ground. I did add plastic panels under the deck so I can now store things under the deck and they don't get wet. Also thinking that under the deck mght be a good spot for a hot tub, but that is a whole different thread.

 

[NW-Bound]

Some people have found a way to do an elevated concrete deck. I wonder about the requirement of the supporting structure. See photo from the Web.

 

[REWahoo]

Looks like some massive columns. Steel beams underneath for strength?

 

[NW-Bound]

Nothing that money cannot solve. For some of us, it's too late to do OMY to get that extra money. Here's another photo from the Web.

 

[bld999]

Looks like some massive columns. Steel beams underneath for strength?

I think the columns are holding up the second floor of the house above.
It could be done new with a 3" slab on metal form-deck over treated wood framing. The concrete in that case would weigh ~34 pounds per square foot.