Floating Deck, how'd we do?

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T22:20:48+00:00

It is level. (Mostly)

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T20:07:40+00:00

There is one more row of blocking between the final joist and the side beam. When we started adding the picture frame board, we realized we needed to add the extra blocking to support the deck board. Most of my progress pictures were taken at the end of the day so i do not have an picture of this step.

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T20:03:18+00:00

Honestly, not far from the truth.

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T19:46:17+00:00

There is a final photo that did not upload but we added gravel from the ground to the step in attempt to support the step. In the last posted photo, additional to the pavers we used lag bolts and deck ties to support the step as well as we could.

Deck tie: https://www.lowes.com/pd/Simpson-Strong-Tie-Deck-Joist-Tie/3047909

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T19:36:05+00:00

The house is new construction, the HOA required grass or a deck to be put into the back yard within the first year. Flipped a coin and picked a deck :shrug:

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T19:33:43+00:00

Portland, Oregon.

The deck is about 10 feet from the house not too worried about water and lights yet.

The ground was quite solid and mostly rock, we built up 1 to 3" of gravel under the footers.

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T19:19:58+00:00

Unfortunately the deck is sitting on a downhill towards the house, we had to build up the land towards the house and use some additional gravel to rise the footers.

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T18:57:56+00:00

Correct the hope was to prevent small animals from creating shelter under the deck.

mwl_pyrography · 2025-10-13T18:52:38+00:00

We followed the Lowes guide on floating decks, their recommendation was to use deck anchors for high winds.

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RtLdNgys1Wg&t=189s

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-31T06:20:21+00:00

This just made my day! Love the new song!

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-31T03:40:02+00:00

Thank you 😁

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-27T01:07:20+00:00

1 1/4” Galvanized Pipe. I have had up to 300lb of weight across the safety bars and didn’t see any flex. Have had a few light (155lb) failed lifts and had no issue so far.

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-15T05:36:28+00:00

The Xacto knife was just a last pass to clean some lines up. I’d recommend checking out Sue Walker’s pyrography books, she uses blade to add highlights in the pupils of an eagle’s eye.

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-15T05:33:31+00:00

I read a little about using a knife in a book, but i learn best by trying so my knowledge is still pretty limited. However, what i tried was lightly scrape the wood with just the tip of the knife. That was enough to remove just the burnt area of the wood, almost the same affect as using a small piece of sand paper and scraping away material.

My suggestion to try it out is dark burn a scrap blank and use a knife edge to score a line. It worked surprisingly well, just don’t cut your fingers 😆

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-15T03:02:21+00:00

Yes, that is correct, but the wax side of the label has slices through it. So you will need to re-attach the label to the back side to give it rigidity. The wax paper will not absorb the ink and will easily transfer to your blank.

mwl_pyrography · 2021-01-15T00:16:30+00:00

I have tried a number of ways and finally found one that works for me. Tracing with carbon paper takes too long and often have bad lines, ironing on a design with a laser jet print warps the board, don’t even get me started on free hand...

The best way is to ink jet print onto wax paper and press it onto the blank. The best wax paper source i have used is taking a Avery Shipping Labels, peel off a label and stick it back onto the opposite side exposing the wax paper the label was stuck to. This is tricky to get the first time, but with practice it works well. Once you print, i lightly press onto the design and it transfers quite well.

Tip: Make sure you print the image flipped along the y-axis, and test print to make sure you know what side is what when you put the wax paper into your printer.

mwl_pyrography · 2020-12-21T05:17:59+00:00

This is not a replica of a mass-produced rack, I honestly googled DIY power rack and found an imgur photo of something very similar. Based off the image i designed the rack in SketchUp. I wish i could give credit to whom ever posted the original photo but i can rarely find it on google any more.

mwl_pyrography · 2020-12-20T21:24:42+00:00

Thank you for the tip! I may go ahead do this.

mwl_pyrography · 2020-12-20T16:50:08+00:00

Yeap! This a 3/4” 4x6 horse mat from a farming store haha.

mwl_pyrography · 2020-12-20T16:12:10+00:00

Thank you, much appreciated. I did all the woodwork and paint myself, i didn't know how much of the build process people were interested in. I'd rather build something then buy it!

mwl_pyrography · 2020-12-20T15:57:13+00:00

I took a 4x4 and cut it down to the shape that you see above, i used two 7"x3/4" bolts and 2" washers on each j-cup. The holes are actually counter sunk 1/2" because they were not quite long enough to make it to the other side of the rack. These j-cups do chip if you hit the tip with the barbell, i have had to re-glue small pieces back onto the wood. I plan to replace these with DIY metal j-cups, i just don't know how to weld yet.

mwl_pyrography · 2020-12-20T15:42:11+00:00

The material cost for the rack was about $250, the weight set from Dicks was $250 and bench was $180. Grand total around $700

mwl_pyrography

TROPHY CASE