Hi all, I built decking in my garden last week when it had been nice and sunny for a few weeks. I managed to get down the frame and around half of the boards, using 5mm cuts of wood to space each board. The problem came this weekend when I went to lay the rest, the original gaps had grown to around 8mm! Doing a more extensive Google revealed that freshly cut wood (I have no idea if it was) is likely to shrink, whereas I had assumed it was at its narrowest due to the recent weather. Would you recommend I unscrew the boards currently laid and relay them at 5mm gap again or will this damage the joists? If I should, is there a better way of doing it than using 5mm bits of wood? Some of the boards were delivered warped so I need to push it up to the 5mm cuts to get a straight line. Thanks!
A 5mm gap is to big, as you have found out, I always used to lay them with a 3mm gap this then increased to 5/6mm when it had dried out, but just last week I laid a small area of decking and did'nt leave any gap, this is on the pretext that it will produce a gap of 2/3mm when dried. As for taking up what's already laid it shouldn't be to much of a problem aassuming you screwed them down.
It shouldn't move, I screwed it down enough! No one wants a big gap between boards. Just wanted to see what people's experiences was with boards shrinking and if they advise pulling them back up and relaying closer together.
That's reminded me of a question, why don't wooden boats sink when the water soaks through the wood? Answer, they don't because it doesn't!
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