Need advice-- Wood deck, inground pool

[tphaggerty]

I have Trex on my back deck, the original gray stuff (origins it is called). It DOES NOT get hot, at least in New York, despite what every lumber store person will tell you. I have Timbertech on my front porch, which is a tongue and groove composite, I wouldn't recommend it for a pool deck due to less than stellar drainage.

We are currently putting an Oasis deck around our IG pool. This is another composite, it is thinner than Trex, a bit heavier. But, it has to be pre-drilled or attached using another hidden fastener (not Tiger Claws though)). It does get hot, but not too bad, I would guess it would down south. One of the nicer things about Trex is that it is a bit softer, so you can use small trim head screws and you can sink them right into the Trex without predrilling. They basically disappear.

For our deck, which is at grade with the concrete pool collar, we dug down about 9", put a pressure treated form around the outside of our deck footprint, filled with gravel, then built a 2x6 frame resting directly on the gravel to support the deck. I went with 15" OC, with the boards running perpendicular to the pool (no seams that way). I actually built 3 "boxes", then postioned them in the gravel, leveled them then lag screwed them all together. I also sunk about 4 galvanized fence posts inside the frame and cut them off below the top of the frame (just to make sure the deck didn't creep away from the pool).

We don't have any of the water standards, our issue with the inspector was the construction itself - he had never heard of it. But, since it was on-grade, he couldn't do anything about it except insist on a frame inspection. The construction is very similar to how railroad tracks are laid (in fact, my brother is a RR construction engineer and he thought it was a great way to go). Should the deck sink at all, we can just use a bottle jack to lift it a little and the gravel fill will fall in and self level.

I am still in the middle of putting the decking on. Although it sounds like you can't use the gravel, you can still do the 2x6 on ground. I would be happy to shoot a few pictures if you are interested. My neighbor has a smaller Trex pool deck built on a frame directly on the ground (again, at pool grade). He has had it for about 7 years with no movement at all (in NY!!).

As for composites, they are great! (I have 3 different ones now, I think I like Trex the best). I think you either like them, or you don't. IPE is a good alternative, but I know of more than one person that had to return a whole truckload due to getting junk. That really isn't a problem with composites. Plus, I'm not sure that IPE would hold up that well to the constant wet/dry exposure of a pool deck, PLUS, you have to seal the IPE (I believe) and you don't with a composite (so no runoff into your pool).

An on grade deck is a lot of work, but ours is really turning out nicely. BTW, I am doing the work myself because all of the contractors wanted huge bucks to do this, even though material costs are less. It isn't what they are used to doing.