Deck railing–level or follow deckslope
Finished a deck today. I told the guy I work for that the railing didn’t look level and he said it followed the slope of the deck. I guess he’s right, especially if you use pre-cut balusters. I still think it looks better to be level and have each baluster plumb. Then when you compare it to the house and fence and neighbors’ houses and fences, it matches siding lines, fence tops and so on.
Marc was going to cut the decorative tops off of each baluster and put a top rail on–flat 2×6. I said he could put the cut off tops back on and it’d look like they ran through the top rail. He just laughed. Ended up notching the rail around the balusters and that looked fine.
How “should” it be done?
[I feel bad because Marc told me to drill the pilot holes in the small balusters (100 of them) and I did–piling them on the joists as I finsished them. Then he asked what did I do with the torx bit he had taken out of the screw driver and put on one of the joists. I never saw it, and looked all over and never did find it. It had an extension, so it seems like I would have seen it or heard it hit the ground (covered with plastic).]
Replies
How much slope are you dealing with?
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
Well, the old one sloped about 9" in 16 feet, but I think we lifted it so it only slopes about 2" in 16 feet. (We replaced deck boards, railing, and posts and added three more posts (there were only three in a 16 foot square deck!)(basically just keeping the old joists and ledgers).)
For 2" I'd run the handrail level. If you were talking a foot, I would keep the posts plumb and let the rail follow the slope. Otherwisw at some point the rail will either be too high or too low.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
For 2" I'd run the handrail level. If you were talking a foot, I would keep the posts plumb and let the rail follow the slope. Otherwisw at some point the rail will either be too high or too low.
Ditto FastEddie, but I would probably do it slower.
If it is not obvious, an ADA ramp and rail requirements would be screwed up with a level rail and sloping ramp / deck.
set it temperarily both ways...
stand back and take a look from more than one angle or perspective...
what looks best to ya...
go with that...
Torx bits seem to be sold everywhere.... get a replacement or two...
Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming
WOW!!! What a Ride!
Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
Yeah, I should get a couple Torx bits--it was in an extension with a sleeve that can be moved down over the head of the screw if I'm remembering correctly. Seems like he could have put it in a more secure place, but.... One time I was so happy I picked one up before I vacuumed it up with all the trash on the floor, then I apparently threw it away with a handful of trash I'd picked up so it wouldn't clog the vacuum nozzle. I found that one quickly in the trash bag. Better than the time I dropped his battery powered drill and cracked it. I told him I'd replace it and he said it would cost $200 and I said that's about what I expected. He bought a replacement. The old one still worked.
I prefer to run the railing plumb and level
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There is a handicap ramp on a commercial building in my town that has the posts/rail run on the slight incline of the ramp. It might have seemed like a good idea but it looks horrible, especially where the ramp meets the level sections. IMO posts, ballisters,and railings should always be level/plumb.
My thinking is that a plumb post will support more like if someone falls and grabs the rail than a post that's following the slope of the ramp. I suppose most posts are strong enough no matter what angle they're at, but my "intuition" makes me feel more comfortable if they're straight up and down.
Your handicap ramp may look terrible, but that's the way the Feds want it. No, let me restate that. If it's not that way, that's the way they sue you over it.
Thanks for the replies. I guess that it wasn't off by enough to make a big deal out of it (but I did notice it, so it wasn't like a 32nd of an inch). The pre-cut balusters pretty much force you to have the rail follow the deck (or at least the rim joist).
Level is best for the top handrail.
Edited 5/10/2006 4:21 pm ET by Big Lou in Chicago
Regardless of your deck slope or lack of, the railing height, curb, pickett spacing, lateral force resistance and other design issues are going to be set by a building code, assuming your locale has adopted a formal code and enforces it.
Well, we did space the balusters 3-1/2" apart; does that count? (No permit.)
As long as we're on the subject, we put three posts in in the middle going across the deck and just attached them to the joists (which run perpendicular to the line of these posts). We did put in bridging at this point, but I wondered how much good those posts really are with no beam between them. The deck is much better than it was, but...I would have liked to have done it so it was nearly perfect.
Like, I pointed out a low spot in the dirt at a corner under the deck (part of the house sticks into the deck about 3' and in the corner was a low spot)--since the ground is covered by black plastic, I said this would make a great little pool (great for growing mosquitoes and for water to eventually work its way through the foundation). I wanted to throw dirt or gravel under the plastic to fill the hole, but we didn't.
Just for gits and shiggles: What if the deck were sloped more than 2" in 16 feet, would you guys always run level regardless of deck slope? I'm just curious because that's the opposite of what's done inside the house (where level and square are often myths).Justin Fink - FHB Editorial
going with what looks good generally works over square, plumb and level..Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!<!----><!---->
Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
Even with railings though?Justin Fink - FHB Editorial
if the top of the rail meets code 100%... yup...
'cause when the woman of the house sees it... it has to astetically please her...
with the woman of the house .. astetics rule...
she may not know what it is she sees... it just needs to please her and meet code... she will more than likely only know whether does or does not like it and not have a clue as to why for either...
say you have 2" of SOA... the SOA could be 0" or 2" or 1" for that matter... it will be relative to what it looks like.... put the rail in to fit, be right, functional and make the HO estatic...
if yur baulisters aren't plumb... all bets are probably retty much off... if the newells or what ever it is that you are tying into are inmovable and oringinal and out of plumb or square or...... then fudge on the plumbing of the baulisters... blending them in is normally the call here...Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming<!----><!----><!---->
WOW!!! What a Ride!<!----><!---->
Forget the primal scream, just ROAR!!!
My thought was ... if the deck has a small slope, or is uneven, then a level handrail would look best. But if the deck/ramp slopes significantly, it might be better to follow the slope. The small slope could be the result of poor framing, or sagging framing, and the level rail could make it look more correct.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
The joists did have a dip in the middle (besides falling off 9" or so, which ,as I said, we corrected just to have enough slope to drain). I proposed flipping them, but they were toe nailed to the ledger (and there were hangers, but only a couple nails in each hanger--I went back and nailed through every hole). Actually, we could have flipped them because several joists were pulling away from the ledger (out of their hangers) and were below the ledger, so we shimmed them up. We totally removed the rim joists, but they were only toenailed--no hangers, of course. Well, the job is done and I've been painting a kitchen the rest of this week.
In my recollection, the space between ballasters cannot be greater than 4". The way the code states it goes something like, "the space between verticals has to be such that a 4" diameter sphere will not pass between them." The ball shape makes it hold true in all directions. This is from the International Building Code (IBC). Certainly it depends upon your binding code, but your 3-1/2" space is probably fine.