This is a story about how Amateur Carpenters Build a Deck . The story begins with a monster. That’s the name I gave to a 10 foot privacy fence around our 12×24 above ground pool. I built it about ten years ago. However, after three years we got rid of the pool because it was under too many trees. After another couple of years I decided to tear the monster down and save the wood for some future project. I carefully stacked the 4x4s, 2x6s and 2x4s in the back yard for another three years. The future project came last week. It was a deck for our 28 ft Coleman RV we have on our land in Arkansas.
It almost goes without saying that I am an a amateur when it comes to carpentry. However, I am not without some experience. I did build the monster, a tree house, and another deck for our second above ground pool we put away from the trees. So I figured it would be relatively easy to build this deck.
First of all two of the uprights were already in place. We had hired real carpenters to build a shelter over the RV. We were able to use two 6×6 posts to secure one side of the deck. We used two 4×4 post from the monster for the other.
This was the first challenge. When building the monster I had used 2 ft medal spikes that are designed to hold the 4x4s. This worked well on one post. The spike went in with minimal effort.
Not so with the other. You must understand that bed rock is near the surface on most of our property. After about 15 minutes we decided a drive to the True Value hardware store was needed. We bought a pick, a 5 ft digging bar and two sacks of QwikCrete. Back on the property it took about an hour of breaking rock to dig the hole. We set the 4x4s with QuikCrete and proceeded to attach our recycled 2x6s to form the frame for the base of the deck.
I should add at this point that Brenda remarked that some of these boards didn’t look so good. I nonchalantly replayed they’d be good enough. So we proceeded on building a frame work of interlacing 2x6s and 2x4s to support the floor. Soon, however, we were running out of recycled wood. So we took a break and went to Mountain home to the Home depot. We bought the floor planks well wood for the ramp and some extra two by fours and four by sixes.
There is a great little restaurant in Calico Rock called Between the Buns. It is sort of a hole in the wall family style restaurant with a varied menu and daily specials. We stopped there for take out. Brenda had chicken fried steak and I had cod. We took the food back to the land and sat on the deck to eat dinner. As I finished my meal we both stood up and the deck fell down! More precisely, one side collapsed. It was a 2 x 6 part of the outward frame that broken in two.
As we were both unhurt yet very discouraged we decided to call it a day and begin again in the morning. I was up early and at work by 7 AM. I unscrewed all the flooring and set it aside. Then at Brenda’s insistence we braced every single board before replacing the floor. Midday I made another trip to the true value hardware store four more screws. I also stopped at Between the Buns for another takeout dinner. We finally finished by 7 PM. Next trip we will put up the roof; hopefully without another disaster.*