Time to rebuild the rear deck on the house. I am aware that Lowes and Home Depot have some sort of deck-design programs for use in store. However, learning to use the stuff in store while still spit0balling ideas sounds like a no fun plan. I do see how it might be the plan for final component specification.
Is there any free program that I can do on-line? A search just keeps taking me to those two places or other vendors that want me to be in-store for the work.
Pete
Is this a really complicated deck?
Is your primary concern about things like spans, or basic layout and quantities?
SV reX said:Is this a really complicated deck?
Is your primary concern about things like spans, or basic layout and quantities?
Should be pretty simple I hope.
This is the existing deck. It used to extend to the right, past the garage door to the gate. The nice big flat portion had to be sacrificed in order to create the garage drive through.
Compounding the problem the issue is the waterfall stairs eat up 2' of space.
Then I want to extend this to the water spigot to the left so maybe 2.5'
What I need to do is layout something that uses as much of the existing in ground cement pilings. Or at least minimize new ones.
Lowes deck designer software is (was?) available online for use. I used it a few years back to replace my deck.
It's not software, but this is a good document.
https://awc.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/AWC-DCA62012-DeckGuide-1405.pdf
I'm no help. Graph paper works for me.
https://www.trex.com/build-your-deck/planyourdeck/deck-plans/
https://deckdesigner.trex.com/#_ga=2.26255549.1465032753.1717688959-417851779.1717688959
Start here.
I had limited success with this one, I couldn't figure how to make a few different elevation changes and separate spaces.
Ground level deck...
Practical concern... I wouldn't be surprised to find a lot of rot in those joists.
2nd practical concern... It's hard to salvage diagonal decking. There is a very high waste factor.
Design thought... Could you raise it? If it was higher it would relate to the house better, and less stairs would be needed from the house to the deck.
2nd design thought... Are you considering extending the deck to the left?
Agree with Paul - raise it to door height and have stairs go down to yard. You could have a 4' wide staircase or make it wider, up to the width of the entire deck
One step down from the door to deck height if you have snow in your area.
What you have now is a door landing with steps descending down to a lower deck. Unfortunately, that size landing is too small. I think that the minimum dimensions for a landing in this situation is 8x8 feet IMO, enough to walk out of the door plus place a couple of chairs and/or a grill. After that you can have wide or narrow stairs descending down to either a wood deck or a paver or concrete patio. An 8x8 landing with a concrete patio would also be your cheapest option. Second option is a large deck at the door level.
Also remember that decks and stairs should be designed for at least a 40 psf live load and 10 psf dead load for a 50 psf total load because you would be amazed at how many people you can stuff on a deck during a party or family photo shoot.
SV reX said:Ground level deck...
Practical concern... I wouldn't be surprised to find a lot of rot in those joists.
2nd practical concern... It's hard to salvage diagonal decking. There is a very high waste factor.
Design thought... Could you raise it? If it was higher it would relate to the house better, and less stairs would be needed from the house to the deck.
2nd design thought... Are you considering extending the deck to the left?
The plan is to demolish what is there. It is well over 30 years old . Its done a good job.
The hope is that I can build out 2' to the left and 3' to the front. So that will give me like 50 more sq ft of deck. I will also get rid of the forward facing stairs and just have a landing outside the sliding door with a set of stairs going down to the lower deck towards the garage door.
At one time |I thought to build pretty much this exact deck that I found on line.
The thing is that the high deck would have me looking out over all the neighbors. Not ideal. So then I decided to move the front railing back to where the stair is and drop the front of the deck down to ground level. This would leave me with a raised landing as I come out the door and a left hand turn to walk down to the lower deck level same as the pic. No railings on the ground level portion.
Going through the software links. Thanks for those.
Pete
In reply to NOHOME :
I'm not suggesting either high or low. I think it would work best somewhere in between.
I can't speak for the building code in Canada, but in the US a deck can be 30" high with no railing, and a stair with only 3 risers does not require a railing. So if the deck was at a mid height, you would not need a railing at all. It would also reduce the footprint of the stair (giving more space on the deck).
In reply to SV reX :
I watched a 300 pound guy walk off of a 30" high deck in the dark once. He didn't break anything but it wasn't pretty. That's a very bad safety loophole and a giant lawsuit waiting to happen. 42" guard railings are our friends.
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
I don't disagree. I wouldn't do it.
But it does enable compromises which are more acceptable (like a toe board at the edge to avoid a chair slipping off, or railings that are lower than typical to enable the view, or continuous wide stairs around perimeter to make the deck connect to the yard better). It enables design choices that are not one size fits all (like slapping a 42" railing on everything just because).
FYI- 42" rails are not required anywhere in residential. That's a commercial guideline.
I live on a lake. Every property owner is completely obsessed with the views. No one would find a 42" rail with close spaced spindles (like previously shown) acceptable.
But I still build things that are safe and to code.
Goat wire is a great alternative to spindles. So is airplane cable, and plexiglass. Rail heights are sometimes determined by line of sight when in a chair. That doesn't mean 24" handrails, but a standard deck rail at 42" would block much too much view (and is a big problem when a guard rail isn't even required). Your 300 lb man would not have walked off the 30"deck if there was landscaping, or hardscaping, or a built in bench or planter to help him be aware of where the edge was.
Guard railings are SOMETIMES our friends, but there are also other design choices that are both safe and legal.
The lower level will be about 1' above the lawn and the upper landing from the door will be 30" above the lower deck.
There will be a railing separating the two leading to a stairwell with a handrail; necessary because the leading steps will not be there. That gives me about 20 sq ft of lower deck back.
The current deck does not have a handrail, and while that was fine for 30 years, as we get older and winter keeps happening, the rail seems like a good idea.
I had no luck with the deck building software. I can do AutoCad and Solidworks if I had access, but those programs made no sense. Back to graph paper.
Home Depot has a deck consultant program, so I hope that if I go in with my sketch he can convert it to a plan and material list.
In reply to SV reX :
Thanks. I didn't know that the Handrail IRC (International Residential Code) was different than the IBC (International Building Code) which also covers residential buildings (I suppose the difference is whether if it's a private or commercial residence. So many exclusions and exceptions to deal with and remember. 
Almost need to be a lawyer to understand it all.
BuildingCodeTrainer.com: Residential Guardrail Height Requirements
My brother in law found this show on our Samsung smart TV internet programming which was entertaining to watch as long as I didn't have to do any work. Canadian deck building:
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
Nohome is in Canada, so neither the IRC nor the IBC technically apply.
The diagrams you showed are residential only. There are lots of things in that diagram that would not apply to commercial. (And several things missing for residential)
Also note.. there is a difference between a guardrail and a handrail. Both apply to what Nohome is doing.
As described, no guard rails or handrails are technically required. (In the US). But I'm glad he's adding them to the stairs. 😊
In reply to SV reX :
Lol, and all of these years I thought wrongly that the "International" in our building codes names meant that they where universally adopted world wide. They aren't even universally adapted state by state or province by province. I guess it's more like just a suggestion.
Canadian vs. US building codes, what’s the difference?
In the U.S., codes can vary by state, county, city, town, and/or borough. There are over 1200 separate code adoption jurisdictions in the U.S., although a majority of those jurisdictions have adopted the International Code Council series. Several states that have their own codes (such as California, Florida and New York), base them in part, on some version of the ICC series with changes that accommodate more local considerations.
In Canada, there are less than 20 jurisdictions allowed to separately adopt codes. But while some of them adopt the Canadian model codes ‘as-is”, some jurisdictions use the Canadian model codes as a base, and then modify them to include requirements specific to their jurisdiction. Some of those jurisdictions allow implementation of more local modifications, with certain conditions.
In reply to VolvoHeretic :
😂😂😂
Yeah, the word "international" is a total pile of baloney.
Plus, of the jurisdictions that utilize the ICC series, every jurisdiction adopts different years of the ICC codes, and they don't even standardize all the trades with the same year.
There may be essentially only 1 Code Council, but we have to build to whatever year version a municipality happens to choose to adopt. My last job has 15 different applicable versions. We had to build to the 2015 IBC, the 2018 Plumbing code, the 2021 fire code, the 2018 Electric code, etc...
Contractors get to have to figure out how to sort it all out. I'm knowledgeable about current codes, but they don't necessarily apply (depending on where I am working).
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