Lifting deck – step down is way too high.
kaseylynn603
| Posted in Construction Techniques on
Hello- we hired a total hack of a builder to build us a very small deck 5×8 that you get to via a sliding door in our house. The drop down is currently a 10 inch step down!! 10!! We need to raise it for obvious reasons but really prefer not to have to take it all completely apart and rebuild. Our current carpenter doesn’t seem to have any creative ideas. Can’t we just take the main frame off the ledger board and then raise the whole thing (probably with new posts)? Would love to find some creative yet up to code ideas to share with him!!! Thank you!!
Replies
Yes, you could do that fairly easily. Why did he build it so low? maybe there is a good reason such as a drain line in the way.
Nope. He was a terrible carpenter. We ended up having to fire him. Working with a new guy now. But he seems to think that the approach I just laid out won’t work. Additional thoughts?
What is his reasoning? We are going to raise a 14 X 16' deck 4' in January. Not really a big deal and I don't expect the actual jacking part to take more than 4 hours for 2 guys.
Have you considered adding a step below the door?
While considering how to raise the deck, make sure the attachment to the house is done correctly. To prevent expensive rot to the house and for safety, the code has become quite specific and somewhat difficult to flash and attach a ledger board to a house. If the first builder was a bad builder, make sure this was done correctly or it could come back to bit you.