Nesting Progress II

Sometimes before you build up, you need to tear down. This one is all about tearing down. Deck

Our deck has been in bad shape since we moved in two years ago. Despite that, I wasn’t too worried about it until I started looking at replacing it. Once I began educating myself on what a safe deck is and what it means to be up-to-code, I started worrying a lot more.

The old deck was :

severely under-supported, with 5 4×4′s holding up a deck 8 feet off the ground.
not anchored to anything as it was using dek-blocks for those 5 4×4 posts. For reference, using dek-blocks is not appropriate for anything over 36″ and you need about 5 times the quantity used.
lacking appropriate beams and joists, most of which were nailed together to make them fit the space available.
holding up a railing with major gaps and loose boards
popping nails out like crazy all over the decking.

So, with a wife growing larger by the day, I needed to make it safe. There was no way to fix it. So, up went the tape: