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diyspa

Repair or resurface deck above living space

diyspa
14 years ago

I have a deck above a living space that is leaking. I found the issue but have had conflicting advice on repair. The original deck appears to be a poured concrete surface on top of of thick rubber membrane. The rubber membrane was not properly attached to the brick siding. When it is raining and windy the water runs down the side of the brick and behind the membrane and into the area below. For some unknown reason the poured concrete doesn't seem to have much if any slope. This must have caused a drainage issue and to remedy this the previous owner built up a 1/4" to 1ft slope on the concrete with a sloped sand base with a ceramic tile surface on top. That layer covered the top of the rubber membrane so I didn't see the real issue until I took off the layer of sand and tile. Here are a couple of pictures that show the issue.

My question is how to fix this. I would like to pull the entire deck up down to the joists and resurface and re-slope the surface. I want a tile deck and have read it is recommended to put down a 1.25" mortar bed and membrane. I like the wedi board material to replace the mortar bed. I'm pretty sure this is OK. The big question is how to flash the deck to the walls. The contractors say it is standard building practice to flash to the brick siding. I would like to have it flashed to the building wrap under the brick but that is a pretty expensive step. The deck is 29' x 13' with two open sides and two sides connected to the house. What is the best way to fix this?

Thanks much in advance for the help.

Comments (11)

  • john_hyatt
    14 years ago

    O Man!!! I hate that. The dammm thing might have worked if the guy had cut into the brick/morter line and Flashed it into the brick under the roofing and installed fall in the roof

    See that morter line? Thats where the flashing should go. No other way to fix it DI. And your right the roof has got to have fall to the outside doing that with the grout wont work you got to figure all the water is runing down to the roof wont really matter how much fall is in the grount.

    The Fix......Will be Spendy. J.

    The Fix...

  • diyspa
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    Big mess fixing the deck. It ended up being 11 inches of concrete, mortar and tile. We cut away the brick, flashed to the sheathing, rebuilt the brick, installed sloped joists, new subfloor and then wedi balco board on the subfloor.

  • john_hyatt
    13 years ago

    Major repair/rebuild.

    Are you using a membrane roof or a coating ?

    John

  • weedyacres
    13 years ago

    Wow, good for you for tearing it up and making it right. You do know that you owe us finished photos, right? :-)

  • john_hyatt
    13 years ago

    That is intersting product. It makes a great shower pan never seen it used as a roof before.

    Attention to detail is everything follow the directions to the T. Cool thing about it the tile can go on almost right away. J.

  • diyspa
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    Yes we did follow all directions. For this large of an area there is a lot of labor because you have to tape and caulk all seams and screws with the Wedi Sealant. Right after the last screw was down the first tile went down. Here is the picture of the completed Wedi surface.

    You can see we are using the Schluter expansion joints on the edge and through the middle. Double careful not to have cracks.

    The other thing we did was to pre-place the railing posts directly onto the plywood. I had the railing guy make a 4" plate with welded posts to it. We cut out the wedi board and placed it on the plywood and then wedi taped over the top of it. The plate and bolt heads are just at the level of the top of the 10mm wedi board. After the deck is tiled the railing guy comes over and levels the rail, cuts the post to the right length and welds the railing to the post. The previous rail was attached to the top of the tiles and of course cracked every single one.

  • john_hyatt
    13 years ago

    Very Good Di!!!

    Did you have a lot of time invested finding a Co to put the system down? It defentley seems like thay have done it before.

    Yo Di, watch that first step. J.

  • diyspa
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    I had a great travertine guy who did wedi board for my bathroom remodel last year. I used the same guy to lay down the wedi balco outside board. He uses it a lot and swears by it.

    Before

    After

  • diyspa
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    The deck is finished and looks great. Not a drop of water underneath so far. Initially I has quotes from 16K to $23K but that did not include removing the existing deck!? I have about $13K into it. About 50% labor and 50% materials. The Wedi Balco board and the Schluter edges and gutters are expensive but I think are worth the money.

    We happen to be doing a spa at the same time. What a mess but almost over.

  • diyspa
    Original Author
    13 years ago

    Here is the "before" to show how much concrete was on the deck.