9 Tips for Building a Perfect Deck

it's got around here today's exciting episode is  sponsored by scotia scotia is a online learning   community with thousands of inspiring classes  for creative and curious people explore new   skills develop existing interests and get lost  in your creativity I've been taking a course   called understanding web development a beginner's  guide to the web by Christopher dawn he covers the   difference between the front and back end of a  website and learning basic skills and writing   code the course is refreshingly straightforward  and as someone with no experience in this area   I'm finding it pretty easy to follow along there's  been a lot of downtime lately learning a new skill   helps keep me sane and it's fun Scotia is giving  away two three months of premium membership to   the first 1,000 people who click the link in the  description below and after that but certainly   around 10 bucks a month so whether you're King to  pick up a new skill fend off some boredom or you   just want to be creative during your downtime  skill share is the place to keep you learning it's got bran here and today's exciting episode  we're gonna talk about dicks because of this   quarantine period I've looked at a lot of old  footage and we build a lot of dicks so today   is exciting episode is 9 tips that will help you  build a perfect dick first tip involves materials   and stainless steel screws see when I first  started building and for the first few years   as a builder I would nail the [ __ ] down I would  use nails that had an angular groove kind of like   a verse so the problem with nailing the dick is  that it doesn't hold the [ __ ] borders down over   time the timber shrinks and expands and eventually  the nail gets pushed up on a lot of old dicks you   probably notice that when you're walking around  on it you can feel the head of the nails below   your feet and that's it's sticking up because  it has no has no resistance that little groove   on the side of the now isn't enough resistance  to keep it in the timber and that's why screws   are better so the thread on the top is for the [  __ ] and the three of the bottom is for the dick   framing the reason I have so many of these types  of screws because that's what we use mostly this   stainless steel that's the other thing I recommend  stainless steel it costs a little bit more but   you're not gonna get that bleeding out rusting  that a lot of screws get we usually use quite   nice hardwood [ __ ] I'll talk a bit more about  that in a minute you know it's quite nice to look   at so I like to use a subtle screw with a small  head to take the attention away from the fixings now speaking of screws there is a screwing tip  to do it quick and Pato taught me this one one   into the chalk there then the other end now we  line up the board with our chalk line and that   chalk line is parallel to this line of [ __ ]  you know that we've got two parallel points we   chuckle the boards in between and we get wedges  open up to get and even the now it's pretty good yeah that's how you get it all straight without  taking forever so having those boards the way   we did in the video they're in fixed rate  positions means you don't have to focus so   much on the middle ones you can focus more on  getting the screws straight and it's kind of   fun as well and the third and final tip related  to screws is markup it's alone but don't forget   to rub the pencil a now I think a telltale sign  of a average dick is wonky fixings so I like to   get a straight edge out and Mark the framing  from one into another and draw a little pencil   marks all the way along the pencil line also lets  you mark the distance from the edge of the boards   and so you get consistent spaced screws oh yeah  and don't forget my dad's golden [ __ ] advice   which is no pencil marks keep a eraser or  sandpaper with you and rub those suckers out if you want your deck to stand out if you want it  to look beautiful build a hardwood deck in recent   years I have heard more debate around soft woods  and hardwoods and which is better I think hard   wood is more durable it's gonna take a knock a lot  better than a softwood wood it's more resistant to   decay it has natural tannins and oils in it that  um that pine for example doesn't pay and relies a   lot on the treatment that's pumped into it also  the hardwood that I use has a lot less knots in   it and knots can really weaken [ __ ] a lot of  cracks start from knots yeah hardwood has a lot   of benefits personally it's also nicer to work  with but that doesn't mean you should never use   pine the difference between pine and hardwood here  and price is quite a lot so if you're building   like an axis way or just some sort of [ __ ]  that gets you from A to B maybe it's an entrance   to a back door then I would probably go with  pine because it's low cost and easy to come by before we go on here is a bit of a warning about  hardwood in particular Aquila and vitex here in   New Zealand so whenever I'm installing vitex I  end up with like black marks all over my palms   that is the tannins leaching out of the timber  usually when it gets wet so that happens for   up to six months after the decks been in store  but after it's bleached out it's usually good   now the reason that is a problem is if you  have other things around your dick we did   this concrete path for a client and they asked  if we could install a queerer face on each step   we're going to put a little cui ler facing on  here to finish it off and once that's on then   these stones will come around here as well but  we don't wanna put that on because Quiller has   oil in the oil leaks so there are the facings  there and they are gonna remain there until all   the oil has withered out of them at which point  we were then unscrew them and screw them there   it took a few months but the tannins eventually  leached out and then once they were gone we   installed the facing on there and the puff looks  beautiful so yeah watch out for hardwood bleeding   if they're [ __ ] you do happen to choose you  want to stain it or seal it with something but   if you decide to start staining a dick you just  got to know that you're gonna be doing it quite   often some people say two times a year I usually  recommend reapplying the stain once a year I'm a   fan of like clear varnishes and stains rather than  colored ones the colored ones are hard to maintain   an even color over time as the dick wears in  different degrees so a clear stain would probably   be the way to go also here's a little detail I  like to do when installing the [ __ ] so we like   to put a bit of oil on the end we would cut it it  helps seal the in grain so it doesn't soak up too   much moisture and eventually crack so if you seal  it when you're installing it you prolong the life   of the dig just a little bit what I do is I run  this along the cut end of my Deacon board now   what that does is it rounds it off the same way  that the edge is rounded off when you buy it so it   feels like a professional factory cut all the way  around I highly recommend doing there it's another   way to give it their professional look tip number  eight is the underrated tip I think people don't   consider what is underneath their dick if you're  going to close in the sides for example use some   timber use [ __ ] but maybe leave a bigger gap  than you would on the flat surface of the deer   this allows the underneath of [ __ ] to ventilate  and get some airflow in there and that will lead   to a longer life for the timber also the ground  beneath the deck should have some sort of weed mat   at the very least the amount of times I've pulled  up decking and seen a forest beneath the but if   the decking boards there's a forest growing under  here just like a native for us to it's amazing how   much light can actually get through those digging  boards so a bit of weed mat sometimes you can put   polythene down if you want to another thing to  consider would be drainage where's all the water   going yeah think about what's underneath the  deck think about how ear and water is going to   behave once it's gone between the digging  boards and tip number nine is find a way   to hide the ingrain this is another way to show  that the Dickens had a bit of effort put into it over time if you look at the end of a decking  board that's where the moisture goes in there's   where the cracking starts it doesn't look that  good I either like to use a fascia which is a   board on the edge of the decking in the vertical  position I like the dick and go into that or I   like to do a picture frame around the perimeter  the thing to consider with a picture frame finish   is it requires a lot more framing because we're  doing a picture frame we have to add add all these   blocks in here yeah pretty much the end of the  boards see ya 9 tips to build a beautiful deck   obviously there's a lot more those were just ones  that I think of a lot and things that I've learned   over the years so yeah I hope that was useful  to somebody out there I hope the video didn't   come too late maybe you're already 6 weeks into  quarantine and you're halfway through your dick   realizing how many mistakes you've made after  watching my video I hope that isn't the case   some other things to consider when you're planning  the deck would be size and position here in New   Zealand people usually think just build it big  build the biggest dick I can possibly afford but   that isn't always the best approach I think  because you've got to restain it once a year   you've got a you realize after you've built it  and you've put your [ __ ] chairs out there that   actually a breeze comes through every afternoon so  maybe think about where the windows think about if   you could do a wind barrier what kind of furniture  you want sometimes a roof is a good idea as well   there's so many things you can do with the dip  maybe watch some of my other videos that I'll   pop up at the end of this one where I get a bit  more in depth about the building of it and yeah   have you got any questions comment below and I'll  be sure to keep it in mind when we inevitably   build another dig thanks for watching catch you  guys in the next exciting episode and choose

Channel: Scott Brown Carpentry

Views: 458,177

Keywords: Skillshare, deck, diy

Id: 3iSBTvV206c

Length: 11min 15sec (675 seconds)

Published: Thu May 07 2020