I am planing a new deck and the decking with be 5/4 x 6 cedar. It is “green”, but from what I have seen from cedar that I have bought from time to time that while not perfectly dry, it is not “wet” and the amount will vary.
From limited experience it does not shrink near as much as WET PT SYP.
But I don’t have a clue about what kind of spacing to use as a min.
And for safety what is a max. If possible I want to adjust the spacing so I won’t have to ripe 16 ft pieces to width.
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William the Geezer, the sequel to Billy the Kid – Shoe
William the Geezer, the sequel to Billy the Kid – Shoe
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To me it depends partly on the height of the deck, but we have been using 5/16" to 3/8" as a gap with 3/4" and 1" deck boards lately... mostly because we've built a couple of low decks and I want maximum airflow under them. Larger gaps also help when it comes time to clean the debris out of them... easy to just shoot them with a water nozzle. With green material I guess I might go 1/4" or so, but you're going to get negligible shrinkage unless the material is soaking wet.
This is a 2nd story deck.Thanks..
William the Geezer, the sequel to Billy the Kid - Shoe
Yer right, it won't shink as much as SYP even when green. So, I use my speed square blade as a spacer on most semi dry wood.
Last 5/4 deck in SYP I did I laid em tight but not forced and they opened up to about 3/8TH" fat and that is my answer to your second question. I think under a 1/2" is max. I like girls in heels and hate buying them new shoes.
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Last year I had to replace a couple of SYP on a customers deck. And the replacement would not even fit. Keep the material in the my garage and about 6 weeks later they dropped in place..
William the Geezer, the sequel to Billy the Kid - Shoe