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Took a while… After the coat of primer/undercoat, there were a little too many visible joints for my taste (and also my wife’s). So a quick trip to Rona to buy some paper tape (I only had the sticky mesh tape) and I had to reapply a little mud to smooth it all out. Tapered joints are easy to cover up but butt-joints are not so easy. Apparently, there’s no real trick, paper tape and a very wide mudding surface to create the illusion that it is smooth is the only way to go. Oh and for anyone doing work plastering work close to areas already finished Richard Vac-Hand is a wonderful gadget. Hook it up to you Shop-Vac and about 95.3% of the sanding dust is taken care of automagically! Very handful especially when sanding ABOVE your head.

As you have noticed, I’ve slowed down in my postings lately. Primary reason is lack of time! I already mentioned about the work upcoming in the laundry room but we’ve decided that finishing the stairwell to the basement had higher priority. So these past few days, I’ve been in drywall hell. I already didn’t have too much fondness for putting up drywall but let me tell that putting up drywall in a stairwell sure ain’t a source of pleasure with me. Total I bought 4 panels of 4×8 and one panel of 4×10 drywall. The 4×10 is used to dress up the bottom of the stairwell going to the second floor and since I didn’t want any seams on there I had to go with a bigger panel. A pain to put in place but worth the effort since I’ll have a smooth looking “ceiling”.

I finished putting all the pieces together yesterday and also started mudding the seams. I should be able to finish the first coat tonight and will sand early next week for coats 2 and 3 of the mud.

Wish me luck!

These past few days I’ve been fixing my mistakes. When I did the framing in my basement, it was my first experience at doing that so I did it on a “I think this is right” basis. Well, when I completed my first room, I discovered that some parts I had done wrong… I’m about to instal ceramic tiling in the laundry room but before I start I have to fix one big mistake which was the framing for the door. I hadn’t enough 2×4’s for a proper door enclosure.

It’s all fixed now. So the next steps will be making some room in the other areas of the basement to temporarily relocate the washer, dryer and feezer in order to do the tiling. I’ll be putting the tiles directly on the cement floor. Tiles are cold anyway, subfloor or not, so might as well save a few hundred bucks by not putting a subfloor at all.

When I’ll start, I’ll try to have someone take a few pics.

Ca nous a pris du temps mais la teinture du deck est terminé. Le faire en deux teintes demande beaucoup plus de temps surtout que nous devons attendre 24 heures entre les deux couches, pour chaque teinte. Nous sommes super content du résultat cependant et ne regrettons pas du tout notre décision.

Les premières photos sont disponibles sous le billet Teinture du deck

Il est certain que si nous avions opté pour une seule teinte, nous aurions possiblement terminé mais le découpage causé par les deux teintes ralentit l’avancement des travaux de teinture tout comme la température. Voici les dernières photos avec une sans teinture pour fin de comparaison. Avant:

Etape 1:Plancher et revêtement du bas

Etape 2:Grillage de côté et début de la main courante

Aussi, je voulais vous montrer la différence entre la première et la deuxième couche:

Lien vers Google Translate: French to English

Sans vouloir être prétentieux, je crois que nous une des plus jolies cour de notre rue. Nous essayons de combiner et d’agencer des éléments de différentes natures: le bois, le ciment, la pelouse, les plantes, les fleurs. J’essaie de convaincre ma femme de se partir un site sur les plantes et les fleurs mais je n’ai pas eu de succès pour le moment.

Voici quelques unes des nos fleurs que je trouve particulièrement jolies:

We’ve already covered preparation let’s tackle the staining itself. First, the conditions must be right. Most manufacturer recommend something like between 10 Celsius to 35 Celsius. Too cold, it’ll take forever to dry, to hot it’sll dry too fast and won’t penetrate the wood resulting stain that could chip and of course less protection for your deck.

The best is to do it on a cloudy day or when the surface to stain is in the shade, the wood must not be hot/warm to the touch. Get some good brushes. Cheap ones will lose their bristles and that’s a pain. One thing to verify is how to apply the stain. There’s 2 styles and it’s based on the products. Wet-on-wet application, which means that you apply the first coat, give it a few minutes and then apply the second coat before the first is fully dried. For a fence, this means that you do 3 or 4 planks then do the second coat. The other style is of course wet-on-dry, which, as the name implies, means the first coat has to dry fully. Typically, this means 24 hours.

As far as products, there’s a ton out there, in every quality. For us, we’ve used Sico 211 Semi transparent Alkyd wood stain for the fence and are very happy with the result. That stain is very thin so it’ll have tendency to run which can be annoying if your neighbors doesn’t apply the same color. The final finish is also matte which is nice for a fence in my opinion. As far as application, this is wet-on-wet stain.

Sikkens Cetol DEK Finish which gives an outstanding result. Pricier than the other one but simply marvelous! It’s give the wood a glossy finish, we’re considering putting the deck in the house during the Winter! We’re kidding of course, but you get the idea. Cetol DEK Finish is a wet-on-dry application requiring two coats (as far as I know, most other Cetol products require three coats).

You just spent a few bucks to build your deck, there’s two ways to protect your investment:
1. put it in a glass bubble, which kind of defeats the purpose of having a deck
2. protect it with either a sealant, stain or paint

Let’s hope you chose option 2. Now, I’m no wood stain expert but I’ll do my best to explain how I’m finishing my deck. First, I assume that the type of wood used can be a factor on determining which type or protectant you will use. For us, the deck is made with white cedar from the Gatineau Hills. Cedar has natural protectant against rot which makes it a good choice for exterior woodwork such as decks, patios and fences. On to preparation.

If the deck is brand new, wait a couple of weeks to make sure the excess humidity seeps out of the wood, let it dry. Then, especially if you walked on it, you need to clean it. We used Sico Formula 22, which comes in a powder. Mix it with warm water in a plastic bucket, apply liberally on the wood surfaces, wait a few minutes, use a brush with rigid bristles on the dirtier areas and rinse thoroughly. Sico’s Formula 22 will remove the molds and the dirt from the surface. It is biodegradable and will not harm your surrounding vegetation. Leave a good 24 hours to dry fully. Formula 22 will also be used to clean already stained wood prior to a refresher coat. It shouldn’t harm stain if it was properly applied.

Some people might recommend cleaning the surface using a pressure washer. I wouldn’t recommend it on soft wood like cedar. I would believe you’ll be more likely to damage the wood. Sure, doing it by hand is more work but in the end, it’ll pay off.

Once clean and dry, for the best results, you need to sand the wood. This step is only done for wood that hasn’t been stained before. Use 80 grit sandpaper for most surfaces but 60 grit is recommended for walking surfaces. Be careful when sanding, only go along the grain of the wood otherwise streaks might show when you’ll apply the stain. Remove the dust before going to the next step, staining.