What You Need To Know About Trex Vs Plastic Decking
Contents
Weathered Wood
It’s not wood, so it shouldn’t be expanding and moving the same, right? It actually moves more AND more unexpectedly than wood decks. Some composite decking won’t move a bit and others have been found to shrink, swell, warp, twist, bow, and any other word you want to use in amounts unheard of, even with wood.
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Your deck will thank you by looking better and performing better and potentially adding many years of extended lifetime to your whole deck structure. if left untreated and unchecked, mold problems can lead to decay and potentially cause serious safety and structural issues with the entire deck structure. The correct way to resolve mold issues with different types of decking materials varies widely. Plastic decking, which is 100 percent recyclable such as Azek, looks like wood. It might expand and contract in certain climates, loosening joints and making decks unstable.
Trex Composite Decking Company Information
- Early-generation composite decking (Trex Origins®, Trex Accents®, Trex Profiles®, Trex Brasilia® and Trex Contours®) represented a breakthrough for low-maintenance and durability.
- Periodic cleanings with a composite deck cleaner were far easier than the dreaded sanding and staining required to maintain wood decks.
- A professional house low pressure wash could not make any headway either.
- To address these issues, Trex introduced a new kind of high-performance decking in 2010.
- I called TREX in late June or early July and a Kevin asked me to send him pictures.
Sometimes the materials fail, but it’s very rare. Every material in the construction trade can have a bad manufacturing run. In fact that’s true of just about anything you buy. That’s the reason we have lemon laws for cars and laws protecting consumers.
Decking
Is it better to stain or oil decking?
Whether you should oil or stain will come down to what you want from your deck. A stain will improve the appearance of the deck, but oil will better help preserve its condition. However, you can bring back the natural look of the wood by using a pressure washer or choosing a decking oil with UV inhibitors.
Probably the first thing a homeowner will notice is white spots on the deck. These are exposed wood particles bleached by the sun and rain. This is a sure sign that the deck's seal has been damaged. Exposed particles, besides creating unsightly white spots, swell when they get wet, and can cause the decking to split and degrade over time. It is simply not possible to keep the plastic from being worn away or compromised by UV.
But the big different is the top of each plank and the top third of each side is capped with a solid plastic that's embossed with wood grain. The capping material also has some extra coloration to simulate the real look of wood. My wife is a very tough critic of all things that are made to simulate wood. She feels this is the closest she's ever seen of any product to replicate real wood. In the summer of 2016, I replaced all of the generation one Trex decking at my home with Trex Transcend. The Transcend product has the same, or similar, core of wood fibers that are encapsulated by plastic. The wood fibers inside the decking are getting wet, rotting and fueling the growth of mushrooms.
I enjoyed that decking, it never stained, easy care, and the new owners of that home tell me it is still holding up well! Thus getting Trex for this house currently seemed like a no brainer. The homeowner stated that he is using Trex decking boards to build a table. We do not warrant our decking product for use as anything other than a decking board. We don't know whether the boards warped from use as a table as opposed to decking.
What is the coolest decking material?
While Ipe is the coolest option, Cedar decking is a close second as it maintains a temperature that is a few degrees cooler than Redwood when exposed to the sun.
ormal use of the deck wears off the protective plastic coating that surrounds the wood particles in the composite, leaving them exposed to mold and mildew. They look like composites, but these boards are actually 99 percent virgin PVC plastic, very different stuff from the polyethylene-wood mix found in most composites. Run-of-the-mill boards start at $4 per square foot, while the premium products that closely resemble tropical wood run up to $7.20 per square foot. VEKADECK is the best deck board in the entire vinyl decking industry.
How does composite decking hold up?
There's No Composite Timber Decking Canberra Maintenance Involved
While it is true that composite decking requires much less maintenance than traditional wood, it doesn't mean there's no maintenance. You will have to do some work. A little soap and water every few months will keep your composite deck looking brand new year after year.
But to paint the whole category as bad is absolutely false. There are bad brands of products in every building material category…doesn’t mean the whole category is junk.
It’s very difficult to get and they only offer their products to the top decking companies in the country. If the article was to say there are a lot of cheap, garbage composites out there…I would agree.
Composite Decking
I have had issues with the somewhat over-priced Trex lighting controls. I will say the lighting systems look great when functioning properly. I have used the various hidden and exposed fastening systems made for Trex installation. With the hidden fasteners, future board replacement will require deck screws and plugs to install new boards. Color-matched plugs are not available for some, if not all Trex boards that are ribbed on their underside.
These are the conditions that mushrooms, mold and fungus seem to thrive in. Trex had a class action lawsuit which stated they needed to replace my deck that was bad with the material choice they gave me and they paid shipping. They had a third party estimator come out to estimate product required. The installer came and looked at it in July and was also puzzled as he'd never seen anything like this before, and I said I would try the Deck Brightener. At that point I told him to pull out those boards and replace them since Trex did not seem interested in resolving this. I can certainly send a piece of it to Trex if they want it, but at this point I'm so disappointed with Trex. At my previous residence I had installed a Trex deck when Trex was in it's first generation.
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When it comes to Trex vs. wood, there's more to the story than the upfront price. While wood may be cheaper on day one, it could end up costing you far more by day 365 . Trex means quality, beauty and minimal maintenance, saving you time, money and everything that comes with a call to the handyman.
Most expansion and contraction in wood is across the width of the board. The movement along the length of the board is so small that it is usually largely ignored as inconsequential. For many thousands of years, carpenters have contended with expansion and contraction across the width of wood boards and learned how to compensate for this wood movement. If treated pine is properly sealed and maintained, it will last nearly forever. The difference is not how long a well-maintained deck will list but how much work is required to maintain it. Wood decks may require somewhat more maintenance over their lifetimes than do composite decks. But, the difference is not very large, and the gap is constantly getting smaller as coatings manufacturers improved their products for sealing and staining decks.