deck problem

[John D'Errico]

Our house has vertical, rough sawn cedar siding, and an attached treated wooden deck. (We live in upstate NY.)

The problem is the way they attached the deck to the house. They nailed a treated header directly to the cedar siding, then ran joists off the header to support the 1x6 decking. Several times a year I am forced to carefully clean out this joint with the house, to get any junk and leafy detritus out. Otherwise It stays wet and we get carpenter ant problems. I use an air gun from my compressor to blow out the mess from the cracks. This takes a fair amount of time, and almost killed my 4 gallon compressor last time i did it because the compressor is running almost full time for over an hour.

I do have access under the deck, where there is between 1-8 feet of clearance around the house. The deck butts to the house for about 60 feet around one side.

My thoughts are to:

1. Run a temporary support down to the ground under the deck joists for about an 8-10 foot section.

1. Remove the section of deck board immediately above this area.

2. Cut off (using my sawzall) the joists from the header, exactly one inche from the existing header, and making the cut parallel to the header. This might take some care with a sawzall to do accurately. (The joists do not butt to the header at a 90 degree angle.)

1. Once the header is no longer connected to the deck, pull this section of header from the house wall.

2. Nail vertical pieces of Trex to the house, one inch thick, by say 2 inches wide, at a spacing of

16 inches apart.

1. Slip a new header up between the Trex strips and the joist ends. Nailing it to the Trex strips and reattach the joist ends with joist hangers.

2. Replace the deck board in this section, cut back to reveal a one inch gap between the deck and the house.

Repeat steps 1-7 around the house until it is all done.

I'd use Trex spacers to minimize the transmission of moisture to the house in the future.

Any comments? Any better solutions?

Thanks, John D'Errico

[Kenneth Silverstein]

On Sun, 29 Aug 2004 08:51:45 -0700, John D'Errico wrote (in article ):

John -

The usual solution for this is to have a flashing which protects the top of the ledger and the joint between the ledger and house. It's sort of a Z-bar flashing - set and caulked into a 1/4" kerf cut in the siding above the level of the decking. In cross-section, it goes down the wall over the top of the ledger, then down the face of the ledger an inch or so. You notch it at each joist. And install it in a bed of caulk. Here's an ASCII diagram which may help:

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[Roger]

Facing similar challenge, where the deck boards had only a zero to 1/8 inch space (bad) between siding and deck, I removed the first 2x6 board, ripped off one inch the length of the boards, then crafted a z-flashing to fit under siding seam, letting the lower two angles cover header and header face, making a flared drip edge so the water drips away from the wood itself. Used sheet metal shears to cut slots for joists to sit in, leaving the cut tabs running out on the header a little ways, and folding 1/4 inch over each side of joist, caulking and nailing tab to joist top. Jeez, I need a diagram! I like the prior responders text effort but cannot quite suss out the drawing.... Main thing when your finished is you have a broad, quick-dry slot, that is easy to watch, and to clean with broom or hose.....

[m Ransley]

A builder did that to me 15 yrs ago it just cost me thousands to replace the rotted sill, I moved mine away.