Time to begin the winter chores. The temperature has fallen dramatically, especially in the evenings; I’ve even got a thermal on tonight. The mornings are in single figures and it has been difficult to get out of bed in the morning.
With no work on the horizon I’ve decided to begin the long task of covering the deck with oil, only this time I will use a natural coating instead of a stain and so this means that I will have to sand everything back to clean timber. I won’t have to remove too much just the surface “oxidation”
One coat below
I began with the treads on the stairs that lead up to the deck. I removed every second step and will sand them first and then refit them back in the same position before removing the rest of them. There will be two steps that I will have to leave in place do to the railings being connected to them and I really don’t want to tamper with them as they are integral to the structure. That’s the reason why I have only removed every second stair tread, just in case there is any movement as they haven’t been removed in over 15 years and they have survived major flooding along with numerous subtle house movements over the years due to the expansion and contractions attributed to droughts and rains.
I’m using Intergrain Natural Timber Oil and I’ll put at least three coats onto the treads and I might even put four because they are in the sun all the time and they do soak up quite a bit of abuse and of course I need to use them to climb up to the deck. After a light sanding the colour of the timber made its presence known and after just one coat of the timber oil they looked great. A couple of the treads were looking a wee bit rough, looks like someone has been nibbling along one of the edges but the oil will seal it all up and breathe new life into them all.
Two coats
So after I do all the treads, there are fourteen of them, I will move onto the balustrades and hand rails which are all also hardwood. Not all of them are in sunlight all of the time and so they are in better condition, however keeping the birds off them while I process them will be the challenge. There is not a day goes by where at least one birds will happily land and then shit all over the place.
The deck, which is 48 m2 needs to be done also but I will do that last. The timber oil is rather expensive and this 4 Lt tin is only enough to do all the other bits and pieces including the steps of the retaining wall, posts and then the front door. I’ve also got to sand these as well and that is fairly time consuming. So the goal is to get the deck done before the summer heat or the spring heat for that matter.
A few trees and bushes in the garden are getting a bit out of control and I will be tackling them too. I dragged one of the 4 metre trestles out today and began pruning the large bottle brush tree because it has had a major growth spurt and is now nearly 8 metres tall which is way too much and it’s not letting too much sun reach the plants on the floor, plus it’s heading for next doors garden. So tomorrow morning I’ll start with the tree and then when the temperature rises a bit I’ll put another coat on the treads. I’ll refit them and then remove the rest of them and sand and stain them too. Oh, I have also painted all the coach bolts black so that should look rather nice beside the freshly oiled treads.
And so I have many jobs around the place. I have plenty to keep me going for the next few months, in fact but I would like to pick up a wee bit of work along the way to pay for all of this. Mind you as I have said before my retirement plans are to win the lottery………..