Originally posted by eagl
You'll pay a lot more for the synthetic and you probably won't get the money back when you sell... A properly sealed deck will probably be cheaper and sell just as well. Seal each deck piece before putting it together so you can get the whole thing sealed. Put on extra coats as necessary and replace any that warp before they change color too much.
too much sealer will cause puddling and sticky shiney spots which you dont want.
Most manufacturers reccomend only 1 coat of sealer.
If applying a stain or a tinted sealer make sure you work the entire length of the boards from one end to the other maintaining a wet edge to avoid lap marks.
If you start one board. or series of boards (I usually do 3-4 at a time. )
Do NOT stop on those boards untill you have reached the end.
In otherwords
Once you start a board or series of boards. Dont decide to take a break or go to the bathroom or stop for any reason untill the length from one end of the board/s to the other is completed
Again. this is to avoid lap marks.
If you dont. What you will end up with if your looking down at it is a series of horizontal stripes going against the grain against a verticle surface
Had a potential customer turn down my bid on staining her house because fo price to hire someone "Cheaper"
Told her. "Well You can get someone else to do it cheaper, or you can have me do it right."
Well I used to drive past that house almost every day and watched it progress
Soon as I saw the name on the truck who ended up doin the work I knew what was gonna happen.
After a week her once beautiful cedar planked horizontal siding had been stained with a semitransparent stain which is what she wanted.
Unfortunately that horizontal siding now had a series of vertical stripes running up and down the entire thing where he worked vertically against the way the siding ran instead of horizontally.
Next thing you know Im getting a phone call from the lady asking me to come back and take a look at it and see what I could do to fix it.
(interesting her change in attitude too)
Well I saw an opportunity here.
Since the guy that did it I know to do low quality work for a absurdly cheap price. And since the lady was so "Friendly" (read pissy) the first time.
I refused saying "I warned you this would happen. You didnt go out to buy your BMW and expect to only pay for a Saturn did you?"
And that I was now too busy to fix it in the time frame she needed it done. But that since he had started it already he should be the one who finished it since they already had a contract he was obligated to finish it right and for the same price. Told her she would now be better off going with either a solid stain or just painting it which is exactly what she didnt want.
but now thats exactly what she has.
He ended up finishing it. From what I understand from one of her neighbors that I regularly do work for after some rather loud arguing and threats of a lawsuit.
I know it hand to kill him financially both in material and time lost redoing everything.
Which is just fine by me
