We are about to go out for bids on rebuilding our deck which was added to our house long before we purchased it. The deck is old and no longer to code. Worse, it was made from pressure treated wood. We know we don’t want pressure treated again. We are trying to determine whether to go with composite, ipe, mahagony or perhaps something else. We know that we would prefer easy to maintain but are willing to go the extra yard for the best choice in durability, longevity and overall satisfaction. If it were your deck, what would you choose? Who’s product would you select? Why?
Thanks for your perspective.
Looking for guidance,
KPH
Replies
kph,
I did ipe on my deck 10 years ago, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Never any finish, still fine to walk in bare feet, no splinters.
I just did a small deck for a customer in Trex Accents. They love it, and it does not get much sun. Plastic decking can get hot underfoot. Your mileage may vary.
Fill in your profile, as your location helps make the suggestions flow easier. Best of luck to you. Come back and post pictures when you build it.
Bill
Edited to add: Definitely use stainless steel fasteners if you use fancy decking. Near the ocean, use stainless everything, even underneath, or it'll rust out within 20 years to the point of failure.
Edited 4/2/2009 12:59 am by BillBrennen
what color is the Ipe now after 10 years? care to share a picture of it?
silver grey like the background at bottom of this frame
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that's what I'm hoping for. If it were the deck of a coverd porch would the color age differently due to different sun exposures or more equally?
It's the UV aging. I have a customer withga covered and he rolls out a ratan matt rug in summer, so when all the furniture is picked up and put away for winter, the differences really show.It even stays more original under the 6" wide railing after four years. eventually it tends to catch up.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
John,Silver gray, like Piffin said. All wood turns that color in the sun, given enough time, even purpleheart. It looks "distinguished" like graying at the temples does on a gentleman.Bill
If we are ok with graying, how much yearly treatment is required to keep the deck in good condition if we go with IPE?
Zero treatment required with ipe. Therein lies the charm.Bill
plastic decking also gets moldy and slippery in conditions where the sun wont dry it out. Also the cost of the composite material and screws is no cheaper than IPE is here in mass.
Thanks Bill for the guidance. Since we get some intense sun during the late morning and early afternoon sounds like composite may not be a good fit. If not IPE, then what is the next best wood, mahagony or cedar?
kph,Mahogany is stronger than cedar, but I don't know how well it weathers. It holds finish very well, and I've always finished my mahogany projects. So I don't know the answer to your question, but I'd guess the mahogany would be better. Expensive, though. I am talking about true mahogany here, not "Phillipine mahogany." You have to watch out for splinters with some of the tropical woods. I did a weathering test in Colorado on purpleheart, and it became dangerously splinter-prone in 6 months, so no good for bare feet. Ipe is very stable, and amazingly well-behaved for such a dense wood.Western red cedar also tends to shrink longitudinally, unlike most woods. Something to plan for if you go with cedar.Bill
IPE`
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Just so you will know what you are getting into, you could be looking around $20 - $30 a sq ft or even more.
but if he uses IPE it'll last foreverNo Tag
True enough. Ipe is the Mercedes. Except that the undercarriage will still be built out of PT or something....
My motivation in making the statement about pricing though was this: I did decks, screened porches, etc for a while. I never installed IPE but pushed the composites. Thing was, that I'd say I gave 6 estimates for composite decks for each job I actually got. Most people had no idea of how expensive they could get. So, I wanted the OP to have some idea of what he was getting into, so that some guy(s) like you or me wouldn't be wasting a lot of their time giving estimates to non-customers.
While I'm at it I'll make another unpopular statement... SYP PT decks can be workable. They do have to be maintained with a coat of stain every 3 years or so. And there is premium (#1) SYP PT decking available (or at least here).
And as long as I'm being un-popular, I'll go ahead and say this too: Project costs have to be scaled to the target property too. While we don't have any idea of the value of the OP's home, an IPE deck on a $120k house makes about as much sense as the 1987 Monte Carlo with the $4800 set of 21" spinner wheels - which admittedly do go nicely with the trunk full of woofer and the 2000w stereo. ;-)
Matt....I couldn't agree with you more.
I've built so many decks over the years, I'm sick of them.
And no matter what kind of wood you put down.....unless it is sealed and maintained regularly, it will all look the same after X # of years.
Yes....certain woods hold up better as far as splintering/splitting.....but I personally, have never been able to justify the cost differences.
I put a deck on my mothers house about 23 yrs. ago. 2 X 6 PT decking. It's weathered and worn......but it is just as sound as any deck I've built since. (Moreso than some.......I'm thinking of a cedar deck I did about 10 yrs ago)
Maintenance is the key to keeping a decks apearance up......regardless of the materials used.
(Disclaimer....composite decking has not been around long enough to give an honest proposal of)
J. D. Reynolds
Home Improvements
One nice thing about the popularity of Trex and other composites is the demand for cedar has lessened, which keeps it reasonably priced, at least here in the Pacific Northwest.
I like the look of cedar and it has natural rot resistant properties. Even when it does eventually have to be replaced, it has no toxins and can serve as a food source for the next generation of vegetation. Can the same be said for composites, or pressure treated materials?
The wife likes to wear heals. How good is cedar in dealing with stilettos?
NOOOOOOO!
Uncle used cedar against my advice.....then went out and bought wrought iron deck furniture.
You can see everywhere that anyone has sat in the last four years.
J. D. Reynolds
Home Improvements
what cedar? Mine is Port Orford and it is really HARD. My wife CAN damage it when she starts hacking at ice, but it just doesn't show any thing from shoes and out iron furniture and normal shoveling.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
All we see is western red cedar... Ms Piffen's ice chopper would definitely give that distressed look<G>http://www.tvwsolar.com
I went down to the lobby
To make a small call out.
A pretty dancing girl was there,
And she began to shout,
"Go on back to see the gypsy.
He can move you from the rear,
Drive you from your fear,
Bring you through the mirror.
He did it in Las Vegas,
And he can do it here."
Same here....I've used sponges with greater density.
J. D. Reynolds
Home Improvements
I'm not saying it's that bad. Most dents raise back up after a rain... but an ice chopper is a whole nother story.http://www.tvwsolar.com
I went down to the lobby
To make a small call out.
A pretty dancing girl was there,
And she began to shout,
"Go on back to see the gypsy.
He can move you from the rear,
Drive you from your fear,
Bring you through the mirror.
He did it in Las Vegas,
And he can do it here."
What....you don't appreciate my sarcasm? ; )
J. D. Reynolds
Home Improvements
Nah, I'm just like Ms. Snort<G>http://www.tvwsolar.com
I went down to the lobby
To make a small call out.
A pretty dancing girl was there,
And she began to shout,
"Go on back to see the gypsy.
He can move you from the rear,
Drive you from your fear,
Bring you through the mirror.
He did it in Las Vegas,
And he can do it here."
"The wife likes to wear heals. How good is cedar in dealing with stilettos?"
Not good.
Yeah- but WHO CARES!!!!! C'mon man, STILETTOS!!!
Tried walking in Stilettos lately?Whatever works.
BTW - what ever happened to that guy "ProDeck"? Can't remember his real name... Maybe he's posting under a different name?
That's funny you ask. I just last week exchanged voice mails with him after not talking with him in a few years.Bob Simonson is his name. Great guy.
I remembered ProDeck was west coast.... Was it WA? I'm guessing so if you are buds with him... Wonder why he doesn't come here any more. Wonder if he had to get a bigger office yet to house his hammer collection?
BTW - my family is from WA - mother - Newport, Father - Centraila. My great grandfather was Mayor of Centraila for a few years. He was bigtime out there in the early 1900s. There is (was?) a (very) little town nearby that bears our surname.
Centralia in the early 1900s? I am pretty sure that's about when the labor movement wars were going on out here. Lots of colorful local history surrounding that. "Wobblies" and all.
We live maybe 30 minutes north of Centralia. They are right on Interstate 5, but for some reason don't seem to have grown much over the years we've been here. They are probably next, though, just south of the state capital and a short sprint up I-5 to Tacoma which is a pretty large industrial city on Puget Sound.
What town are you talking about? Buccoda? Roy, maybe?
Galvin. I'm shocked to see Wiki has it. My great grandfather's name is cited there. He was big in real estate and logging. He had 6k acres. It was only an intersection with a post office and a few old delapidated buildings and houses 15 years ago when I went out there.
Nope- seein as how I'm a card carryin man club member. But if a lady with nice legs wants to strap some on, who am I to get in her way??? Especially if she wants to pair them with those hose with the stripe up the back.Me? I'd break an ankle in those things!!!
So would I...
Those things are made to look at, not walk in.
They're for high maintenance gals whose
job is to stand around and look pretty.
What is one of those gals doing OUTSIDE on a deck anyways? The wind would mess her hair.
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The wind would mess her hair? Shouldn't she have JBF hair? IN that case the wind wouldn't matter.
Maintaining her tan...minus the stilettos.Hey, have you ever noticed that after cutting Trex all day you smell like Hefty bags, and your hands feel kind of slippery?
Don't like Trex, no sir.
It almost doubled in price in SoCal this year. You'd think that after oil prices went down, plastic would follow. Oh well...
Can you post a picture to help with the visual??
you guys down south can get better SYP PT for decks than I can for trim up here, for sure.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
>> you guys down south can get better SYP PT for decks than I can for trim up here, for sure. <<
Gene is up your way and uses logs for trim - doesn't he?
And I can actually get PT trim too :-), in limited profiles - like base cap, brick mold, and shingle mold. I perfer PVC trim though for exterior applications. A few houses back I got some 3.5" PVC casing that was like $2.50 a foot... :-( I ordered an extra piece by accident and couldn't bring myself to throw it away - it is in my construction trailer. Proably be there until the plastic termites eat it...
I hear youGood pointsNo Tag
Dang... doesn't someone want to argue with me? I feeeeelll so, so, unappreciated.... wha wha wha ;-)
OK, I'll argue.
The best materials are solid. Stone or concrete don't need the maintenance that wood does.
http://www.stonedeck.net/
'Course, it may mean that you got another job installing the underdeck drainage system...
Ipe` needs maintaining?
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
If IPE is the Mercedes, what is a notch below? Just curious.
garapa is next down...
then meranti
alaskan cedar is knotty, but hard
regualar cedar is a little too soft for deckingMike Hussein Smith Rhode Island : Design / Build / Repair / Restore
We've got a garapa deck, and it's held up quite nicely. Quite a bit easier to work with than Ipe too, IMO.
Best part is that the dog's claws haven't scratched it all to hell. Yet, anyway.
Jason
Has anyone used Cumaru (sp?)?
I have read that is is less expensive and easier to work with than Ipe, probably softer. We are building a deck on the humid, sunny FL coast. Will it weather well and not splinter?
Any advise/opinion is appreciated.
Canberra fits in there someplace, or is it a kind of merantii... or is that a cadiolii??? Doesn't take long to get confused in all these exotic imports.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Meranti can be purchased where I live for about $1.20 per lineal on a 1x4 and it comes pre-oiled with Messmers. Nice looking stuff but requires maintenance and is much softer than IPE. The Blue star meranti is real nice but still pricey and can have lite and soft pieces in a lift, but is available in a 5/4x6 and looks great
We're hit like everyone else is on property value. We are in a high priced real estate county but in one of the 2 low property value villages, even when property values hit highs. We are in the NE just outside of NYC.
if your looking for no maintenance, long warranty with the bonus of dry space under your balcony you may want to look at duradek. Its an exterior vinyl.
Their are also other similar products out there.
And stilettos' wont bother it and your wife wont rip off her heel when her shoes get stuck in the gap between the boards. :)
Are material prices dropping due to what's going on in the ecomony? Are we still looking at $20-30 per sq ft now?
Commodity lumber prices are variable and currently down somewhat. When I say commodity I mean things like OSB, plywood, and SPF dimensional lumber. I have not seen any lower prices on finish building materials, and if anything prices have gone up. By "finish" I mean stuff like windows, doors, flooring, siding, etc. I don't know about the price of ipe, but I checked the prices of composite decking a few weeks ago and it was still as high as ever.
The good news is that with composites there are many more choices (brands) these days, then say 6 or 8 years ago. Newer products have features like built in mildewaside (sp?) etc. None that I've seen seem to have a particular price advantage though.
Re your Q what is one step down from ipe, I guess that would be composites or some of the less known imported woods.
One thing you gotta understand about these high end decking materials. It is not only the material costs, it is the extra labor involved to install them. Ipe, for example is an extremely hard wood and hard to work with. Carbide blades and bits wear out at 4x the rate as with working with soft woods. Progress is slow. Composites, while easier to work with require special screws for attachment. Sometimes these higher end deck materials are installed with special hidden fastener$$. Significant additional labor is required over simply "shooting down" some wooden deck boards. With the high end material, the matching railing components are gosh awful expensive.
BTW - one other thing - in your initial post I believe you said you were planning on "rebuilding" your deck - which I assume you meant replacing. What I'm getting at is that if the decking itself is in such bad shape, the under-structure is probably at least weakened too to the point where it wouldn't make sense to put some kind of "last forever" materials on top of it.
Edited 4/3/2009 5:38 am ET by Matt
Matt is correct about the Ipe eating blades and tool edges but if you are only doing this one deck you are not talking about a lot of dollars.Regardless of what material you finish the deck with if the framing underneath is marginal, replace it and if it isn't already bring it up to code.You said you plan to live where you are for the next thirty years-if your budget allows build it right, build it once. IPE is the only product (in my opinion -which is free and worth every cent) that will do that.In the past I have been able to find Ipe in a 1x thickness (as opposed to 5/4x) at somewhat less cost. The 1x is rated to span 24" centers and it does so easily.Your big savings for your deck are going to be on the labor side as long as you are the labor.oh -if you do go with IPE fasten it down fully as you lay it because if you don't and it moves you will never get it flat again.No Tag
Concrete:
http://forums.taunton.com/tp-breaktime/messages?msg=91581.1
IPE
i like Trex best , but we do a lot of Ipe'
if my customers want wood, we usually go with Ipe'
if they want a composite, I use one of the trex products
composites gapped according to the mfr. is amust for good performance... lot's of installers lay their decks too tight
I love the look of ipe, but can't work with it. It's about the only substance on the planet I'm allergic to, and I've heard others say the same thing.
Andy
"Never try to teach a pig to sing. It wastes your time and annoys the pig." Robert A. Heinlein (or maybe Mark Twain)
"Get off your dead #### and on your dying feet." Mom
"Everything not forbidden is compulsory." T.H. White, The Once and Future King
To all:
In this economy no doubt you all have seen the $20K+ projects get put on hold, meanwhile there are still plenty of people who want new decks but they want them for a whole lot less. And the contractors to build them are hungrier and willing to work for less. Like me. So I think IPE may have to wait for a while and as was said in Massachussetts the labor and cost of IPE makes it comparable to better composite decking.
And what's so bad about Meranti and Canbara? They go grey like the rest, but seem to hold up well and stay smooth for considerably less than IPE. Frankly I think IPE is over rated weighing the cost of material and extra labor against the final effect.
And I have to agree with Matt et al. If you are rebuilding a triple decker porch for three condo owners as I am, you have to find a material that all the owners can agree too. It won't be IPE I can tell you that. What is SYP PT? I'm interested. Suit the word to the action as Hamlet says. When the whole deck is about to collapse, you'd be surprised what people will want to buy just to have a place to park their bum when day is done.
Handy D
Southern Yellow Pine...Pressure Treated. When I was in Tortuguero, Costa Rica I stayed at Luguna Lodge that had lodges constructed with teak porch floors ( covered by a porch roof) that they would treat periodically with oil. Not sure of the frequentcy of the treatment. They had a nice light tan with red streak appearance. More maintanance than ipe but did not have the grey weathering.
Is this a ground level deck? balcony?
It's a balcony, albeit not that far off the ground. The entrance to the basement is about 3 steps down. The entrance to the back of the house is about 4 steps up.
We are looking at about 13' by 14'.
Ipe all the way. You get the special sealer, wax your saw cuts and hidden clip fastners. This deck will last forever. You can get everything from one supplier. If you need it let me know. Derek [email protected]
Ipe harvesting practices are sketchy, at best. This fellow posts here occasionally, and recommends Tigerdeck. Outdoor projects are his specialty.http://decks-fences.blogspot.com/search?q=tigerdeck
http://www.tvwsolar.com
I went down to the lobby
To make a small call out.
A pretty dancing girl was there,
And she began to shout,
"Go on back to see the gypsy.
He can move you from the rear,
Drive you from your fear,
Bring you through the mirror.
He did it in Las Vegas,
And he can do it here."
Ipe will outlast the structure underneath, hard as a rock. You're looking at pre-drilling every hole.
A chain of lumber stores in SoCal (Stock Lumber) sells a type of Mahogany that they call "Mangeris" Decks made of it look like fine furniture.
It's just a little bit more expensive than redwood, and since Trex went up in price, it may even be less expensive than Trex.