Composite Deck Build Over A Garage Door

[Skiff Builder]

Fiberglass Composite Deck Build Over A Garage Door

I had to raise a small slab on grade home after it got hit by Storm Sandy. Went up 12' on pilings. Enclosed the area underneath and got a 32' x 34' shop for my troubles. 2 garage doors in front and an 8' X 8' overhead door in the rear. Wanted to build an upper level deck across rear of house 12' x 32". Needed the area underneath deck to be dry, for working on outdoor projects during wet weather.
Considered wood/ trex/etc decking with one of the Dri deck type systems installed underneath. Also looked at the possibility of slinging EPDM between the joists and decking over that.
P.T. wood takes a beating down here. A lot of the trex /etc decks get hot in the summer sun on bare feet and cost quite a bit.
Ended up going with a fiberglass/plywood composite.



Sunk (4) 11"x 35' pilings, double 2x12 girder bolted on.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Fiberglass Composite Deck Build Over A Garage Door

After the house was dried in, got onto the deck job. Used 2x10 treated joists, 16"o.c.. Installed joists and they sat for about 6 months while other work was going on. They got dried and seasoned during this time. Like most p.t. these days, they varied in width from 9 to 9-3/4". PIA!. Sorted all from least to most and had to rip some of the extremes down.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Onto the actual decking.

Bill of materials 12 x 32 deck:
15 sheet 3/4 t+g ply
40 yards 50" wide chopped strand mat
20 gal poly resin
5 gal gelcoat
4 gal "Smart "bondo catalyst putty
5 gal acetone
1lb pumice
sundries

Cost: $450 wood-Lowes.
$1100.00 glass/resin/sundries- local supply house.

Everything fit in one load in our GMC Yukon. .

 

[Skiff Builder]

Used 10d galv ring shank to nail down the deck. Ripped plywood for deck fascia. Left a 15 deg bevel on the bottom edge for a drip stop.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Day 2 :
Waited for morning dew to burn off. Turned out to be a sunny, windy and warm day. That makes for quick curing of the catalyzed resin- that's both good and bad.
Mixed up a gallon at a time and rolled on a sealer coat. Covered about 4 sheets per gallon. By the time I reached the end, the beginning area was hard to the touch. This is the easiest part of the job.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Next step was to putty- fasteners holes/defects in ply ,etc. Used a bondo type catalyzed product. Even with minimum hardener it was kicking off in about 5 minutes. My wife did the mixing of many small batches.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Next move was to pre cut all the chopped strand mat before wetting anything out. The wind was blowing everything around, but that's pretty normal here. Started wetting out at the outside edge of the deck. Brought the mat right over the edge and fascia. A second person on a ladder to handle the fascia duties would have been nice, but got it done.
The wind kept blowing the mat up- had to use temp staples and cap nails. Was mixing batches of about a half gallon at a time. Once or twice it started to gel in the pail so you go to a smaller batch.
It becomes a bit of a timed race when working large area's. You can't have enough mixing containers/gloves ,etc when working solo as they get gummed up. You keep a pail of acetone and rags handy for quick cleanups.

Each roll of 50"mat overlaps the previous by 2". Works out well with plywood to give you double coverage over the seams. The trick to wet out is to saturate the mat, but not so much that it floats off the substrate. As the resin goes in it dissolves the mats binder and leaves the strands clear. In the pics below, you can see the mat has all but dissapeared.

 

[NUTTSGT]

Looks like a ton of work but I'm sure it'll be worth it once it's completely done.



BTW, I think your work clothes look better than my good clothes.

 

[cmandp]

I don't quite understand why you basically fiber glassed the plywood. Is that going to make it water proof and be the surface of the deck you walk on or just to water proof for your work area below?

 

[Skiff Builder]

Looks like a ton of work but I'm sure it'll be worth it once it's completely done.



BTW, I think your work clothes look better than my good clothes.

Sgt,
It's a good full 2 day job on the decking. I don't think I could do trex and a waterproofing sys underneath etc any quicker.

The glassing is a little messy. I didn't want to ruin any work clothes and too hot for Tyvek suit. Old dress clothes fit the bill -use and than burn the itchy stuff in the fire pit that night while enjoying a cold one!

 

[Skiff Builder]

I don't quite understand why you basically fiber glassed the plywood. Is that going to make it water proof and be the surface of the deck you walk on or just to water proof for your work area below?

cmandp,
Yes, the glassed plywood will become both the finished surface and the water barrier.
More posts/pics to follow.

 

[ard]

When you ripped don't the PT to lenght, did you re-apply CCA (or whatever)?? Every time I use PT I have to re-seal/re-treat the cut surfaces. Be if.a cross cut, angle or rip...all six surfaces. And usually I like to let it sit in it for a few hiurs.

Wht not PT Plywood?? Seems a weak link. (Unless it is PT and I missed it)

FineHomebulding has a few pieces on similar deck projects.

Great post, BTW. Thx

 

[ard]

Oh, question...

how did you drive those 35 ft posts UNDER the 'raised home'???

 

[DGersic]

What part of the shore are you in? I have a cottage in the Lavallette area.


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[JimVonBaden]

This is pretty cool. I look forward to more!

 

[Skiff Builder]

When you ripped don't the PT to lenght, did you re-apply CCA (or whatever)?? Every time I use PT I have to re-seal/re-treat the cut surfaces. Be if.a cross cut, angle or rip...all six surfaces. And usually I like to let it sit in it for a few hiurs.

Wht not PT Plywood?? Seems a weak link. (Unless it is PT and I missed it)

FineHomebulding has a few pieces on similar deck projects.

Great post, BTW. Thx

Ard,
In this case I did not retreat any cut PT wood. None will be exposed or should ever get wet if the fiberglass stays intact. In fact both the Building Inspector and the glass supply house were surprised I used treated joists. Most folks here use Dfir when glassing. Same with PT plywood- Poly resin does not really bond that well with even plain wood ( compared to say Epoxy resin). Did not want to take a chance. Also the quality of PT ply is not usually great. More knots, cracks etc to fill before glassing.
I've got a number of boat builds using Epoxy/glass/ Doug Fir timber and plywood along with Meranti and Okume plywood. Live in the saltwater with water on deck and in the bilge. No problems as long as the resin and glass are intact.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Oh, question...

how did you drive those 35 ft posts UNDER the 'raised home'???

Oh that. No big deal. You punch six holes from side to side of house about 2' above the slab. Nail 2x10 to walls all around the inside of home. Insert 3 steel beams through each set holes. Run 2 more I beams longitudinally under those and start jacking to about 4 feet. House separates from slab. Build new 14" I joist subfloor under lifted house. Move this whole assembly to backyard. Now you are in the clear to drive 15 pilings for 3 girders. When done jack house to 12' high and slide it forward onto new girders. Nails/hurricane ties and than all the rest of the reno's begin

You know, it is a bit of a big deal 2+ years of every weekend and vacation day and your almost done! That can be another thread sometime.

The pilings are driven in with a vibrating attachment on an excavator. Takes about 30 seconds once started. Sand with bay water underneath is like pudding. Amazinly just one pililng has enough bearing through friction to support the weight of the whole house.

 

[ard]

Much respect.

Figured that was 'the rest of the story'....

 

[Skiff Builder]

After the glass is wet out, you can go a couple ways:
Let it all fully cure, than grind down and feather the overlaps. From there you can apply paint or gelcoat to finish.

I did not grind. The seams are small, and why remove material you just applied? Was able to keep going the same day and apply a light tan gelcoat (looks gray in pics) with pumice added for non skid. Took about 4.5 gals 2 coats. Finished late in the day with enough cure time before the evening dew and bugs came out.
I can tell you that the pole I used for my roller will be around a long time due to it's thick coating of resin and fibers. Cleanup is pretty much throwing everything you used out including your clothes.

This job would have been ideal with three people working. One to mix and manage materials, one applicator and one floater.

 

[walrus]

Never seen fiberglass deck before. What happens if something heavy is dropped on it? will it crack easily. What about flashing to the house?

Looks good, hope it works out well

 

[cmandp]

cmandp,
Yes, the glassed plywood will become both the finished surface and the water barrier.
More posts/pics to follow.

Interesting, thank you for answering my question Skiff.

Was your house flooded from Sandy? I see in the lifting pictures that it was basically gutted.

Sorry for all of the questions but I've seen a lot of houses like yours raised and rebuilt on LBI after Sandy but I never got to see all of the details in doing the work.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Never seen fiberglass deck before. What happens if something heavy is dropped on it? will it crack easily. What about flashing to the house?

Looks good, hope it works out well

walrus,
Same as when you drop an anchor on your boat's deck or your trex home deck-most likely will be fine as long as the glass is tight to the plywood.
This stuff is easy to fix if you need to: grind out the damaged spot down to wood. Cut a patch of glass mat and feather it by tearing some of the fibers away around the edges. Apply resin and gelcoat.

Flashing-Against the house I placed a 45 deg cant strip and glassed up under the siding. The decks ledger has drip edge/Vycor flashing. When enclosing the bottom of the house ,town made me use PT plywood sheathing.Between all that should be good.
Thks

 

[Skiff Builder]

What part of the shore are you in? I have a cottage in the Lavallette area.


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DGersic

Exit 58 across from Holgate.

How did your place weather Irene and Sandy?

I still have nightmares about that ice cream place in your town- the one where they make you stand up and sing while your eating

 

[Skiff Builder]

Finished the deck off with an aluminum railing kit. It's very sturdy and working well so far.

The deck surface has also been great. Not slippery and it's comfortable on bare feet in the sun. Standing up to chairs and tables being dragged across. The splatters of oil from fish fry's and grilling clean up easily. About once a month during the warm weather I'll spray some TSP/water/touch of bleach on it before bedtime. It sits all night in the dew. Rinse off in morning.

The best part for me though is underneath the deck. I can pull a project out of the shop to do some sanding/cutting/painting etc. With garage doors front and rear I can adjust, to channel our frequent winds to blow through to varying degrees. Best spot to sit on a hot day.

We see a decent amount of glass decks on the higher end homes along the coast here. Most sit over enclosed areas of homes or in a few cases become the entire roof. I found it the most cost effective way to accomplish a deck with dry area below.
I think the pro's here get a pretty good buck for doing it.Most consumers are convinced it's black magic and don't think of doing it themselves. Would probably see more if they only knew it wasn't too hard really.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Interesting, thank you for answering my question Skiff.

Was your house flooded from Sandy? I see in the lifting pictures that it was basically gutted.

Sorry for all of the questions but I've seen a lot of houses like yours raised and rebuilt on LBI after Sandy but I never got to see all of the details in doing the work.

Yes , we got flooded. First time in the homes 50 year existence. I got down there right away and had the contents out in the yard, and zipped bottom 32" of all drywall off and removed insulation and took up the new click lock floor the first day. Plan was to fix back up in place and continue to use it weekends.
We decided to wait one year to see how things settled after the storm. It was the wild west-no one in govt/insurance/banking/ building knew what was going on. A lot of neighbors got screwed by contractors.
My first ever claim in 30+ years of home ownership. Got less than 33K insurance- second home. The house raise alone cost 42K. Decided to gut completely and rebuild all myself Added about 1/3 addition to the home and got a decent garage out of it. It was quite an experience!

The best thing about the whole experience was starting the work in July at an all time high weight of 212lb. By Nov I was down to high school weight of 163

Thks, Skiff

 

[ford33]

Interesting thread. Thanks for posting. I had never considered a fiberglass deck before but it is a material used on boats so it should last a long time.

Sorry to hear about your losses caused by Sandy. 60 minutes TV news did a story on the local and federal government's poor response and insurance company corruption and fraud after the storm. It was shameful what was done to homeowners.

I wish you well and hope you enjoy the house for another 30 years.

 

[DHCrocks]

in the first pic of the stack of plywood what is the dado in them for?

 

[DGersic]

DGersic



Exit 58 across from Holgate.



How did your place weather Irene and Sandy?



I still have nightmares about that ice cream place in your town- the one where they make you stand up and sing while your eating

Ah, ok, you’re south of our place.

Irene didn’t hurt us, but Sandy did. We’re 50 yards back from the beach, so we didn’t get direct wave damage, but we had a foot of water go through, and left about a foot of sand behind. One of the first pictures to come out after the storm was this one:

http://darkroom.baltimoresun.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/AFPGetty-515000704.jpg

That’s our beach. From the bright green cottage, go west three, and across the street. Blue cottage, with the porch facing the ocean. The streets are yellow sand mixed with gravel. The white sand shows how far in the waves came, that’s ocean / beach sand, and it’s a foot deep by our cottage.

Some of our neighbors tore down and built new, others elevated like what you did. We decided to fix ours in place, keep it like it was.

The Music Man (https://www.themusicman.com/) is fun if you have kids. My singing is awful, but it’s still fun.

Your deck looks nice. How’s the rest of the reconstruction after the elevation?



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[gtsgarage]

Re: Fiberglass Composite Deck Build Over A Garage Door

Awesome thread thanks for sharing.

 

[wagoncrazy]

Great thread here. Thank you for sharing your experience. Never considered that raising it would give you the large shop you always wanted. Seems like more ought to be doing that...for longevity reasons. The seas will rise over time, so why not just get it over with now.
Question is...can you empty that shop of tools and stuff before the water comes in next time?
Good work here. Glad to see a solution that worked!

 

[Skiff Builder]

in the first pic of the stack of plywood what is the dado in them for?

DH,
Good eye on the plywood. Noticed the entire skid in Lowes had the dadoes in one end. They were small - not fatal. I liked the faces of the ply and found none better that day in our local lumberyard and H.D.
My wife noticed it as I was loading them. Told her not to worry about it.
I just now found out that she went back into Lowes and got 1/3 off the $450 we paid after showing them the whole skid.
I'll also tell you she inspected every stud as I was framing the addition and redo of the gutted house- hilarious- she is a bath designer and doesn't understand framing lumbers knots/wayne/shakes and how to work around them.

 

[Skiff Builder]

Ah, ok, you’re south of our place.

Irene didn’t hurt us, but Sandy did. We’re 50 yards back from the beach, so we didn’t get direct wave damage, but we had a foot of water go through, and left about a foot of sand behind. One of the first pictures to come out after the storm was this one:

http://darkroom.baltimoresun.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/AFPGetty-515000704.jpg

That’s our beach. From the bright green cottage, go west three, and across the street. Blue cottage, with the porch facing the ocean. The streets are yellow sand mixed with gravel. The white sand shows how far in the waves came, that’s ocean / beach sand, and it’s a foot deep by our cottage.

Some of our neighbors tore down and built new, others elevated like what you did. We decided to fix ours in place, keep it like it was.

The Music Man (https://www.themusicman.com/) is fun if you have kids. My singing is awful, but it’s still fun.

Your deck looks nice. How’s the rest of the reconstruction after the elevation?



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The whole job went pretty well and everything still works!. It was a 2+ year marathon. 50-80 hrs/week reg job, 260 mile round trip every wkend for reno work. Slept on the boat year round, took cold showers on the dock Apr-Nov, Camp kitchen in shed, fire pit at night-no TV for 2 yrs-was great.got back in shape.No injuries. Neighbors great. Had a mission - tunnel vision got it done.

After the raising we basically built a new house.Removed every inside wall. Along with building it all got to do a few new jobs I never did before: Baxi combo boiler install/hydronic heat.3 head mini split, full elec sys and service entrance. DWV plumbing.Gas piping.Vinyl shakes.Glass deck. Wood garage floor.

Good thing about DIY was paying for materials as we went. No loans/credit.
Good to have wife in plumbing/ heating supply business.

I did pay the mortgage throughout it all. Bank would call every week from day 1 to see if I was done Told them it would be 2-3 years-they threatened suit/foreclosure as assets were not there to back the mortgage. Told them they could come get the house anytime-they sucked and held insurance $ way too long.
Only had one state building inspector looking for cash....blew him off and kept building. Funny- he lost his job. Town inspectors were more than ok to work with.


I wanted to buy another wrecked place and do it again.They were going for 50-70K for a time. Wife said one was enough for her. Probably a mistake not to...

 

[Skiff Builder]

Great thread here. Thank you for sharing your experience. Never considered that raising it would give you the large shop you always wanted. Seems like more ought to be doing that...for longevity reasons. The seas will rise over time, so why not just get it over with now.
Question is...can you empty that shop of tools and stuff before the water comes in next time?
Good work here. Glad to see a solution that worked!

wagoncrazy,
Getting the shop was my motivation for the whole job! Told Wife she could do whatever she wanted upstairs.

You go in with eyes open , if your by the water this can happen.

Thought a lot about ways to protect contents of the shop. Right now I have no big stationary tools there. Plan to retire there one day, will have to work it out by than.
Thks, Skiff

Any suggestions

 

[larry4406]

Wow! Hopefully your garage under the house doesn't take the next hit.

 

[DGersic]

Re: Fiberglass Composite Deck Build Over A Garage Door

I envy you being able to do the work yourself. We live in Chicago, so had to contract ours, which turned in to something of a disaster. I’d much rather have done my own work.


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[johnyg]

you have some big balls my friend !!!!!

 

[Bigbandguy]

Bastards at the bank probably got a lot of nice beach property by leaning on mortgages. Glad you were able to hold them off and tell them what they are. Probably in cahoots with slow pay insurance.

 

[NUTTSGT]

Oh that. No big deal. You punch six holes from side to side of house about 2' above the slab. Nail 2x10 to walls all around the inside of home. Insert 3 steel beams through each set holes. Run 2 more I beams longitudinally under those and start jacking to about 4 feet. House separates from slab. Build new 14" I joist subfloor under lifted house. Move this whole assembly to backyard. Now you are in the clear to drive 15 pilings for 3 girders. When done jack house to 12' high and slide it forward onto new girders. Nails/hurricane ties and than all the rest of the reno's begin

You know, it is a bit of a big deal 2+ years of every weekend and vacation day and your almost done! That can be another thread sometime.

The pilings are driven in with a vibrating attachment on an excavator. Takes about 30 seconds once started. Sand with bay water underneath is like pudding. Amazinly just one pililng has enough bearing through friction to support the weight of the whole house.

You did all that and didn't create a build thread to document it and entertain all of us ?

 

[JimVonBaden]

You did all that and didn't create a build thread to document it and entertain all of us ?

 

[Skiff Builder]

You did all that and didn't create a build thread to document it and entertain all of us ?

NUTTSGT,
I did not discover this great site until after I was done with the house raising project. I can post it up.
Thks
Skiff Builder