B & G's Deck Update

B & G have been very busy at work and we have been tending to end of summer chores and patio furniture excursions so the deck building has been very slow until today.

Today B and I went to Home Depot and bought the last board needed to complete all the risers. On the way home I had B stop at my favorite consignment shop so I could buy a painted small rectangular kitchen table I saw yesterday for 15 bucks.

The table was looking prudy ugly. It was painted white and had pink laminate glued to the table top. Yesterday I was able to peel the laminate up and take a gander under it. I found oak....yes OAK.

So now the table is mine. I will strip it and then decide what I want to do with it.

Back to the deck.

Once we were done shopping we cut the riser and installed it. Then it was on to the posts.

To make the notch where the post sits on the rim joist we had to use kerf cuts and then chiseled out the remaining wood. The kerf cuts worked best when they were about a 1/4 inch between cuts. We then used a hammer to knock out the cut portions. I used a chisel to remove the remaining bits of wood. The entire procedure took approximately 15 minutes were post. B then sanded the post making sure to remove the sharp edges on all sides of each post.

Here is B making kerf cuts while her mother in law takes photos and a break.
This is the post after all the cuts were made.Here's the post after the majority of wood is removed using a hammer.This is what the post looks like after the chiseling is done but before it is sanded.Finished post before paint.We then measured the post to the correct height and cut. Then we had to cut a notch to accommodate a 2 x 4 at the top. We used the same procedure that we used to make the notch for the rim joist.

The remaining cut was the bevel at the bottom of the post. It is a 45 degree angle with the bottom 1/4 inch cut off.

Tomorrow the posts and the remaining unpainted risers will be painted. Once the risers are all painted I can reinstall the stained treads.

Saturday is R's last race day this year and they need to be at the track at 1 PM so it's iffy if all the painting will get done before they blast off for the racetrack.