My SO and I are about to replace a deck. We’ve been looking at options for decking materials, and wondering about the composite decking. The one we have had shown to us by a contractor is by Rhino Deck. It’s made of recycled plastics and wood. I’ve seen people say they have problems with mold and mildew, but they seem to be small numbers of people
Does anyone have any experience with composite decking? Good, bad, other?
I’m in Minnesota, so hopefully mold isn’t going to be as big of a problem as someone in Seattle.
I made the small deck on the front of my house out of Trex. It’s been only a year. So far, it’s holding up well. No mold problems of which I’m aware, but the spot I used it in gets a lot of sun.
My mother put in a composite deck a little over a year ago I think, and it’s been much easier to maintain than wood. It’s also in the backyard surrounded by trees and a hot tub so it doesn’t get much sun, but there don’t seem to have been any problems.
I have a small deck in the backyard (8x12?) that we put together about three years ago. No problems, looks great, haven’t done anything to it but sweep or hose it off. The only thing we’ve had to be careful of is the kids have made some scratches in it with metal garden tools. (So if you have a good set of deck chairs that have metal feet, you’d need to find something plastic to put on the feet of the chairs to protect the deck.)
I’ve seen it fade too. What do you do with it when it fades? I’ve seen the gouging also. It leaves a rough surface after awhile that isn’t too nice, but that can be avoided using a little care.
I got a new deck put in a couple months ago. After checking out pricing and features, I did end up going with composite decking.
The biggest concern that I came across was whether or not it was going to be slippery. A friend-of-a-friend got TRex composite for a deck 6-7 years ago, and they mentioned that after it rained, the material got very slick. And they said that it didn’t feel “sturdy”, either. So after a year or so, they ripped out the TRex and replaced the deck with redwood.
Based on my experience (I ended up getting TRex after talking things over with the contractor), they may have been using a first-gen product, and those problems have been resolved. The decking I’ve got has two finishes (one on each side): one is a straight “combed” look, the other is a faux-wood grain. I’ve got the wood grain side up, and I’ve gone out on it after a heavy rain, and it’s got pretty good traction. The sturdiness complaint may have been due to the underlying joists rather than the decking. It looked like the composite had a bit more flexibility than wooden boards, so it may require smaller gaps between the joists; my deck has 12" center-to-center and it feels pretty solid to me.
From what I’ve been told, composite does fade in the sun for the first month or so, but after that it (theoretically) holds its color. I haven’t had it long enough to say for certain on the holding part, though. So you probably want to install a color that’s a shade darker than what you want.
It fades and needs LOTS of support, or gets wavey. Holds up better than wood, however. The screws and nails stay put. Doesn’t need paint or any other nonsense.
The National Park Service uses recycled plastic lumber a lot for walkways and benches, stuff like that. I would guess that they chose it with durability and maintenance costs in mind. Then again, being the government, that wouldn’t be a foregone conclusion.
We have a 10’ by 50’ trex deck. In the gray color. It has definitely gotten lighter since it was installed. We don’t have issues with it mildewing or being slick in the rain. We have had it for about 5 years. Having worked on wood decks at my parents house I wanted something that would not need periodic staining or resurfacing.