Building a Deck

Hi all,

We are planning to build a deck off the side of our house. Will be approx 5m at it's widest point, tapering down to 1m (sort fo a trapezoid shape based on our house being set at an angle to the side of the property line).

We plan to run a bearer along the side of the house (dynabolted or similar to the bricks) and then stumps to support the rest of it. Height of the deck will be from about 0.2m to 1.0m off the ground (sloping land too).

So, the question is...how far apart should the stumps / bearers / joists be?

Will be using standard decking for the 'planking' and it won't be supporting a pergola or anything. I heard the stumps should be around 0.5m apart but that seems excessive? I guess not too far apart or the decking would sag. Or can they be further apart if I use thick bearers and then have the joists closer together? (hope the terms are correct!)

Is ther a standard or what have others done successfully?

Thanks for listening.

Regards,
Darren

G'day Darren

0.5mt apart:eek: :eek:
If you went this way you deck would be solid as a rock
I would space your stumps out at 1.2 or 1.6, use 100by75 for bearers and 100by50 spaced at 450 for joist

Cheers DJ

Hi DJ,

That sounds like more reasonable spacing. I thought .5m was too close, but had read it somewhere. Cost me a bit in stumps too!

Thanks,
Darren

Darren,
what's the length of the deck? I assume you'll be running the decking parrallel to the building, so the joists would vary in length from about 1M to about 5. Trouble is my tables only go to 4800 span. At 4800 using green hardwood rated at F11 you'd need 250 x 50. For F 14 you could reduce this to 225 x 50. If you reduced the span to 2.7 (ie you had a second run of bearers on the wider section) you would reduce the joist size down to 150 x 50 for F11 or 125 x 50 for F14. You'd have to weigh up the cost saving in the timber against the added cost of extra bearers and posts.

Mick

Hi Mick,

Thanks for the answer. What if the decking is at 90 degress to the building? Then the joists would need to be parallel to the house, and at the longest about 6000mm.

Where can I find info on the properties of the F14, F11, etc wood? That may be what I need to work it out.

Thanks,
Darren