Deck finish work - fall 2016

Having lived with wood  decks before, I was committed to a truly maintenance-free deck solution for this house.  I never want to be trapped into the cycle of staining a deck every year.  Even the man-made "deck" materials require a fair bit of upkeep as they tend to grow mold and mildew quite quickly.  What holds up well outside?  Masonry.  The decks were all designed to take the weight of a stone or tile finish, and were also designed more like porches with solid decking.  The screen porch and the balcony are similar to each other - treated lumber framing.  The kitchen deck is concrete poured over treated lumber (set up with continuous rubber membrane like a flat roof membrane for waterproofing).  We looked at options, and the best option seemed to be porcelain tile (rated for freeze-thaw outdoors) over cement board backing for the screen porch and balcony.  Same tile will go directly down on the concrete on the kitchen deck.

The prep on the screen porch and balcony included a second layer of 3/4" treated plywood over the existing 3/4" treated plywood deck, seams offset, then 1/2" cement board stuck down with thinset and screws.  On top of that is a rubberized membrane waterproofing that was applied as a liquid (2 coats), and finally tile, also stuck down with thinset.  The kitchen deck would be ready to go as-is, since it is concrete.

Well, since the stone work took so long (plus all the "little" distractions along the way), it was getting into late Sept when this work started.  You need temps to stay above 40 overnight, for sure, but the warmer the better so that everything cures up properly.  It was getting late in the year for this.  I focused on the screen porch and balcony first, so that I could be assured to get them 100% done before thinking about the kitchen deck.  Well I ran out of good weather, so I was only able to get those 2 done, but that was pretty close to my goals for the year.  My goals were all stone work done, all decks tiled, some landscape work done, and the driveway paved,   I only came up short by 1 deck, so I will call that a win and move on into next year...

Some photos...


I had to finish off the post trim and the skirt trim on the deck before I could tile the floors (and partly before I could finish the stone work - you can see that if you look at the stone work photos earlier...)

Here is the screen porch, pretty much done.  Trim boards come primed white.

 Another angle of screen porch trim:

Here is a shot of all the trim work in place and painted. A bit of a long shot photo, but you can see the posts are now wrapped and painted on the kitchen deck and screen porch.  Also true of the balcony, but no shot of that at this stage:

First up for tile: This is after a second layer of 3/4" plywood subfloor, 1/2" cement backer board, and 2 layers of liquid applied waterproofing (the red/pink stuff).  I started laying out tiles here and sticking down the first bit (short day)

 Close-up of the first day tiles.  White things are spacers to keep the alignment.

Day 2 tile....more progress:

Day 3 tile...yet more progress.  I find I am limited in how much I can do in a day as my knees and back just can't take this for a full day.  I can get 2/3 day at best, and it hurts.

All complete on Day 5.  The moving blankets were to help keep the tile warm to cure as we had a cold night that night.  Not too cold, but cold enough to try and help it along with some blankets.

By comparison, the balcony was quick,  This was one day (same day as day 5 on the screen porch), but it is far smaller than the screen porch.  You can see it was dark by the time I finished.

Screen porch all grouted:

Balcony grouted:

Balcony all grouted, sealed and railings back in place.  These are still temp railings.  The final railings are for next summer (2017) where these two decks will also be screened in.  Next summer's big project...

And the same shot of the screen porch:

The future....
As noted earlier, I did not get the kitchen deck tiled this year.  That will be one of the early tasks for next year when the weather breaks.  That typically means just before Memorial Day.  There are a few important main outdoor tasks for "summer" 2017:  Tile the kitchen deck and finish off trim on it.  Make railings and install, including all 3 decks, and screens for the screen porch and balcony.  Build the light posts at the bottom of the driveway (my very last stone work).  Some more landscape finish work. Misc work like final exterior trim, etc

Next up for this winter is moving into interior finished work.  As of today, I am working on the oak bar top for the island and the enclosure for the vent hood over the cooktop to move the kitchen along more.  Once those are in, I will (finally) make the first of the interior doors (probably only 3 of them this year), and then move on to the master bathroom - big project there.  The goal being to wrap all that up before the weather clears and it is time to move outside, per the above list for next summer.  The good part is that after next summer the projects become a lot less critical and more in the "nice to have" category.  Another year after that and it will really be down to the details, more or less. Those final details will drag on a while as they include a lot of trim, some doors, built-ins, etc.  All time consuming stuff, but nothing really critical to living here, just makes the place nicer to live in.