Occasionally we get people who ask us; "am I better off buying solid or composite wood decking?" Because of this, I have decided to add this section to our site. Listed below is a cross section of a piece of both solid and composite wood decking. While composite wood decks can vary in overall thickness, the basic concept is the same. Look at the pictures and then read on.

Solid (Left) , Composite (Right)

When comparing solid wood to composite wood, we tend to think about resurfacing or "refreshing" the deck years down the road. This of course is directly related to the longevity of the decking. Thinking about resurfacing the Deck sometimes is the reason we may be misled into believing that the solid deck is better or will absolutely last longer. This is not so. Let's refer back to the pictures above. While there is no question that the solid wood Deck is much thicker, take a look at where the nail is. When doing your resurfacing, maybe on the second or third resurfacing about 60 to 80 years from now, you are going to run into one of two things. It will be the nails with the solid wood deck, or the plywood core on the Composite Deck. So, with that statement, now do you believe that the solid wood will really last longer?

There are also other important factors to consider. A solid wood Deck is usually less stable than a composite wood decking. When I say less stable, I am referring to moisture and expansion related to that moisture. When you get climate changes in your home, which you absolutely will, wood decking expands and contracts. With solid wood decking, it generally expands and contracts a lot more than the composite wood. Composite Wood decking is constructed to be dimensionally stable, while most solid wood decks are simply cut pieces of wood from a tree. Considering solid wood decks are cut pieces of wood. There is a lot more room for error or "cabin grade" type wood to be used. What we're saying here is that if you happen to see a solid wood deck real cheap, you are probably getting exactly what you are paying for, junk. While the same holds true for composite wood Decks, there is a lot less cabin grade around.

As we mentioned, the solid wood Decks expand more than the WPC decking, and they expand vertically as well as horizontally. While you get little to no vertical expansion with most composite wood Decks, you may get a lot of this vertical expansion of the solid decks. Vertical expansion is when the boards will actually grow up and shrink down in addition to the side to side or horizontal expansion and contraction. The end result of this can be raised beds that sometimes catch your shoes and become a trip hazard. When looking at Wood decking samples, you will notice that most solid, pre-finished wood decks have beveled edges. These beveled edges counteract the raised beds that can become trip hazards, and sort of act as a smoother for the joints. The down side to this is the appearance. Beveled wood decks are not as natural looking. Also, when you get horizontal contraction, when the boards may shrink slightly, unfortunately the bevel edges tend to accentuate these gaps or basically make them look bigger. We have also heard complaints from customers who have had this type of wood decking, that the levels seem to hold the dirt when trying to clean the deck. This could be true depending on the depth of the bevel.

• -http://www.wpcdeckingfloor.com/products/index.html
• -http://www.wpcdeckingboard.com/case/Municipal-Gardens-Decking.html

SUMMARY

We are not saying that solid wood decks are bad or of lesser quality, but here is some facts you should know when considering what to buy. Unless you spend serious money on a solid wood deck, be it pre-finished or raw, you will most likely get a wood deck that will have characteristics as we described above. In some cases, with certain species, you may have no choice because solid wood is all that a particular species is available in. Wood plastic composite decking is available in styles that have different installation methods. They include decks that can be installed using staple down, glue down, or free float methods. Over the past five or more years, the free float method seems to be the method of choice and we'd have to agree with that. Since the free floating wood Decks do not actually touch the sub-Deck, there is a near zero chance that you will have any problems with this deck. Additionally, with other installation methods you get those uneven gaps due to the standard expansion and contraction that we talked about previously. With floating composite Wood Decks, when they expand and contract, they do so as one whole unit, not as individual planks so you see no change.