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BizB
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Deck Part 1
2005-10-05 |
Starting to lay out the size of the deck
Early this summer, I noticed that there was a growing crack in the cement slab that
made up the walking surface of the back porch. It wasn't alarming at first, but
after some time, I noticed that there was also a crack in the red-brick wall supporting
the cement slab. The weight of the roof and the slab was pulling the brick away from
the house and causing the support pole closest to the driveway to appear to sag. One day
while BBCK and her friends were playing on the trampoline, I decided to rip up
the astro-turf carpet that was covering back porch to see exactly what I was dealing with.
This was the day that I understood that I would soon be building a new structure of some sort
on the back of the house.
Look Daddy! There's a.... ummm... it's a... what the hell is that?
Above, you can see what I was presented with when I pulled up the carpet. The hole you see was, for
the most part, exactly how it was when I pulled up the carpet. I am amazed that the carpet hadn't
ripped and exposed the hole. I'm also amazed that this happened at all. I wonder how it came
to be so large. There was an ant infestation in the cracks of the slab, so maybe they had
something to do with it. Lord knows they can move a rubber-tree plant... why not a slab of
cement (piece by piece).
Cheap deck block
I started shopping for decking options knowing that there had been many advances in deck
technology over the past few years. I, being the cheap SOB that I am, was looking for the
cheapest possible option without sacrificing quality. I'm of the understanding that there are
three things that contribute to improving a home's value; Kitchens, Bathrooms, and Decks.
I talked to several people and visited several stores and I was fairly prepared to go with
the traditional raised deck resting on poured cement pads. Then, SOPOPS mentioned
the way he built the deck at their old house. I thought he was crazy. Well, crazier than
I had before now. He said that you could just use cement blocks resting right on the ground.
There was no need to pour cement. You just needed to use lots of blocks. The freeze heave
will be spread across the entire deck through the many many foundation blocks. Interested,
I decided to look into this technique a little closer. On a trip to Home Depot, I ran across
a flyer from Deck Plans hanging right in front of a
large cement block with a cross pattern on the top and a tapered base. "Wow!" I thought, "This
is great!" Then, I started doing some math. Based upon the price of $5.50 per block, and the
40 blocks that I would need in order to build the deck size that I had already decided upon, I
would need to spend $235.40 on just the blocks alone.
Not quite as cheap as I had hoped.
Then, on another trip to Lowe's to investigate wood prices there (Lowe's is considerably cheaper
than Home depot on most things), I stumbled across their display of these deck foundation blocks.
The sign on Lowe's display said $0.96 each. "Wow!" I thought again, "That's cheap!" Unfortunately
Lowe's only had 35 blocks on the display and, as I already mentioned, I'd need 40 to do the deck. So,
I tracked down an employee (Another benefit of Lowe's... you can get help) and asked him if they
had the same blocks anywhere else in the store. Having no idea what I was talking about, he asked
me to show him the blocks I wanted. I took him outside and showed him the display. I pointed out
to him that Home Depot was selling these very same blocks for $5.50 each. To that, he replied, "$5.50?
That's crazy! Cement block sells for about a dollar each... no matter the type." He thought
they had more inside the store and walked me around the department where he believed we would
find them. We didn't find any. The next day, I went back to Lowe's to get the blocks before they
were gone. Being the ever-helpful individual, I went to the display before going inside to
make my purchase. I wrote down the item number, the full 11-digit UPC code and the price that
were listed on the sign resting atop the display. When I got to the register, I told the girl
that I needed to purchase 35 of these blocks and that I would need some help loading them. She
rang up the order and confirmed with me the price per block and the description (which was "8X8
cement block"). Yup! Them's the ones! I'm no general contractor nor am I a cement-block guru, so
how was I to know that 8X8 block was not the description for the bocks that I was buying? Any way...
I asked the cashier if she could call one of the other local Lowe's stores to see if they had more
of these blocks as I would be needing 5 more. She assured me that while I was loading the 35 blocks
into my truck, she would investigate for me.
We were just finishing loading the blocks when
the cashier came out and told the kid who was helping me, "The computer says we have 980 of these
blocks in stock." The kid assured her that these were the only ones they had and that the computer
must be wrong. The cashier wanted to check the item number and so she looked for the sign that
had been on the display. Only, now, the sign was on top of the display next to where the blocks
had been (we moved the sign to get at the blocks.) That's when she realized that the item number
and the price for the blocks that I had brought to her to ring up were for your average every day
cinder blocks. She said that they'd have to do an inventory adjustment and she needed me to come
back inside and re-ring my sale. When she rang it up again, she wanted to charge me the correct full price
for the block which was $5.50 each! I told her I wasn't going to pay it and demanded that she
adjust the price to honor the display sign. Well, being just a cashier, she couldn't do that
so she called for a manager. After several minutes, a manager came up and, to my luck, it was the
same guy that I had spoken to the night before. So, I ended up getting the $234 worth of block for
just over $30.
I have more written up and I'll continue to post updates on the deck each day
until we're caught up. Perhaps by then, I'll have a finished product to show you.
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sopops Wed Oct 05 06:05:50 PM 
BizB Wed Oct 05 03:24:43 PM 
Betty Boop Wed Oct 05 12:38:03 PM 