Home Improvement

Did you anchor it?

Yeah it came with 6 18-inch rebar anchors that I had to hammer into the ground. That + the added weight of the treated lumber platform/floor that I built to set it on, and that damn thing is never moving, short of a direct hit from a tornado(which will also suck if we ever move, no way I'll try to take it with us)

Pff, anchors? Just get fatter kids.

So my house backs up against a wooded area, public/town land. Not sure which. Anyway the segment right behind my house is overgrown. A large tree (70 feet) is sitting on a 45 angle propped up by one 6 foot tree that broke it's fall during Sandy. In any case, vines and shit rule the world. They even started hopping over to my yard.

Had to take a chainsaw to the whole fucking thing. Not done yet, making progress if I don't die.

That sounds terrible.

Controlled brushfire. Go drop a twelve pack of natty light back there, start a fire, call 911 and tell them you saw some teenagers hanging around and can they send the fire department please.

I had to do that when we moved into our house. We have woods behind our home and it was overgrown all the way up to, and over or back fence. Spent a lot of time clearing brush and trees back about 10 feet from our fence. It sucked. My wife got poison ivy real bad. Luckily now that is all done I just go back there each spring and Roundup the shit out of anything new that is starting to sprout up, and that keeps it all away from the fence. Roundup is awesome, it's like small plant napalm

I may have asked this before, so I'm sorry if I have.

Our house came with two brand-new decks (side door and back porch). They're unstained and I'm looking to do that this year. Someone recommended doing a power wash on them and then doing the staining, is that the best route? They're fairly dirty, but I don't know if after 1 year of use it is really necessary or not.

Also, do I just buy stain and go to town, or is there anything I should put on before/after the staining process? Obviously never done this before. Any good brands to look at? Probably looking for a deep cherry color, since we have red shutters/doors.

I'm not too worried about the proximity of our siding, and we have extra in case shit goes south. I was thinking about power washing my grill grates, will they get destroyed (stainless steel)?

Definitely power wash first, before you stain. Then at that point you have to decide what kind of stain/water seal combo you want to do.

The staining will keep the boards from greying, but stain alone doesn't offer quite as much protection as water seal does. And you'd probably need to stain every year, or maybe just every other year for a few years to really get it soaked in good and last quite a while. My next door neighbor is a professional house painter, and he told us to stain our deck every spring for 3 years, and then we're probably ok to just re-do it once every 5 years at that point. It's those initial few stainings that really soak into fresh wood.

Water sealing probably needs to be redone almost every year, and at the very least every OTHER year, it does wear off from both weather and foot traffic. Areas that aren't walked on (railings) might only need to be water sealed every other year, or maybe even every 3rd year, but areas of the deck that are walked on probably need it every year. You can buy stain/water seal combo products, and use those the first few years, and then just switch over to water seal only once you don't need to stain anymore.

All of that being said, some people do water seal only, and actually like the look of greying/weathered wood rather than stain, that's just a personal preference really. If you are water sealing every year, you don't really NEED to stain for additional protection, it's really just for looks at that point.

You'll also want to power-wash any year before you water seal.

Go buy a power washer now if you have a big deck

joeboo how long do you let it dry after power washing before staining? I've got a power washer and I just bought theWagner 0518080 Control Spray Max HVLP Sprayeroff Amazon to do my staining. I didn't even consider a stain water seal combo but it makes sense.

Deck isn't big, so i'll check out prices. Plus we don't have a shed so my basement storage is already limited

Selix_sl said:

joeboo how long do you let it dry after power washing before staining? I've got a power washer and I just bought theWagner 0518080 Control Spray Max HVLP Sprayeroff Amazon to do my staining. I didn't even consider a stain water seal combo but it makes sense.

Click to expand...

I'd plan on power washing one weekend, and staining/sealing the next. And obviously don't stain/water seal if it just rained yesterday. I'd say a good couple days to dry out. Maybe only 1 if it's REALLY sunny and hot, but probably a couple to be safe if you live somewhere were it isn't 90 degrees yet every day.

For a frame of reference, my dad has over 10,000 square feet of decking on his lake home(2 levels) and I've helped him power wash/seal several times. It's a goddamned ordeal every year, it sucks.

One tip though, if you are water sealing only, you can buy your sealer and one of those plastic spray containers meant for doing weed/yard spraying, and fill it full of water sealant and just spray your deck with that. You can get those manual-pump plastic sprayers in any lawn & garden section of Walmart or Home Depot or whatever for under $10. Makes it WAY easier than brushing on. Screw brushing. Now, stain you'll need to brush/roll, so that blows, but you can definitely spray the water sealer. The only caveat is that you'll probably have to buy a new sprayer each year, it'll get gunked up bad from the sticky water sealant and probably won't work again the next year if you save it. My dad buys 2 sprayers each spring and we go to town with the water sealer. He didn't stain his deck(screw staining 10,000 sq feet of deck with a pain brush, that was never happening), but the water sealer works great and the deck still looks great after almost 15 years.(it has greyed, but doesn't look old & dirty or anything, looks good)

If you water seal it every year, it'll stay looking like this:


rather than this:

For the love of all that is holy, don't stain it! Pressure wash that thing clean, and clear water-seal it. That's a short, easy process, do it every other year depending on tree/sun coverage. You stain it, you're going to have flaking colours, uneven coverage, har\d time finding the same colour a few years later...
I'll never stain a deck again. I had it at my last place.

I guarantee his wife will want it stained. Try to talk her out of it

Tell her you'll stain it if she eats leftovers.

Your father has 10k square feet of decking? What does that even look like?!

It wraps all the way around the house, 360 degrees, and is about 10-15 feet wide at every point, and on the back of the house(facing the lake) is 2 levels. Theres more wood in the deck than was used in the entirety of the 2000-sq foot home. The deck is ridiculous(but damn fun to party on)

This isn't his house, but it's basically like this:


his house sits up on a bluff overlooking the lake like that

Get your exercise: