Ipe railing on a trex artisan or timberteck railing system

15 years ago

Can it be done? We cannot do an all ipe railing (code) so we were thinking about ipe floor with a white railing system using ipe as the toprail. One of the contractors states that this is no problem.

What do you all think?

Comments (5)

john_hyatt
15 years ago
JohnAny thing is possible but the conection to manmade with ipe is going to be a little bit of a thing. J.
scotkight
Original Author
15 years ago
It is a county thing. They require official tests to be done on all woods and the details supplied. Currently ipe by one manufacturer is tested, but only for certain uses (floors and horizontal surfaces). Structure and vertical surfaces must use certified materials which includes PT, some cedar manufacturers and most of the composites.

If you drive around here you will see 99.9999% of all decks, even on the higher end houses, are almost entirely out of PT or composite materials.

Total pain in the butt. They specifically pick on "exotic" woods.

This is for a deck on a townhouse. No stairs, about 210sqft.
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Timber Teck makes a T&G decking product. TT rial system is nice looking fairley easy to install but very spendy. What I found along with all the bashing...complaints on composite were about the material itself...complaints on South American lumber were mainley about a bad install/finish job. Its very possible to have a T&G ipe project I have several of them out including my own hot tub room floor. East Teak is a full service Mill that is they can machine/dry the lumber any way you want. There are a few little tricks involved with this install but nothing I could not explain if your Contractor is willing to learn and pay attention to detail, of course this is true with any high end decking. JonMon
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Lyn, when i was planning my deck I looked at several and would have selected Timbertech based on recommendation here and from people have have had composite decks (we ended up using Ipe in the end). I looked into moistureshield (recommended by J Hyatt) but they do not distribute locally. I would stay away from TREX (google "trex lawsuits") I kept links to several websites that you may find helpful for design ideas and who have contributed to Gardenweb or Contractortalk * John Hyatt: http://deckmastersllc.com/ location Oklahoma City, OK * Brooklyndecks: http://urbanexteriors.biz/ location Brooklyn, New York * Deckkman22: www.alscustomdecks.com location Austin,Texas * Builtby Mac: www.builtbymac.com location Eugene, Oregon * Greg : http://www.bergendecks.com/ location Bergen County, New Jersey (seems to do more composite) Best wishes Steve Timbertech: http://www.timbertech.com Moistureshield: http://www.moistureshield.com/deck-design-tools/
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Here is what little I know about codes. That deck doesn't fit in NC but we are ocean and the concern is wave action. FL is generally much stricter but the usual place I hear about is Miami Dade. Gulf side is much different. And then you have a barrier island in front of you. We build upper deck on full pilings (12 inch?). The same ones that the house is on which look a little bigger than yours. My concern (what do I know) is the upper deck is currently held up by something like 2x4's. There has to be something more coming right? The best house is a hurricane is a smooth sphere. Don't want anything to catch wind. I would be concerned (again ocean front) that the wind would rip the deck off and act as missiles to the house. That is a concern with any deck of course - but you would want it to be as strong as possible. Code is incredibly regional and I would hope you have confidence in your engineers.
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mrmichaeljmoore
14 years ago
I didnt use IPE as a top rail....but....
I used the TimberTech Radiance Rail. So far so good. Nice and heavy/sturdy. Not too hard to install. Cleans up easy.

Pics here:
http://ths.gardenweb.com/forums/load/porch/msg102139206681.html
john_hyatt
14 years ago
That is just plain silly even thinking ipe is less structural than composite in a reverse world mabey. You could get all the needed info on Ipe from East Teak 800 338 5636 showing it has been structural for over 150 years.

Not real sure what "pick on them " would mean but it sounds like the green mafia. J.
asullivan
14 years ago
I am currently in process of doing something similar to what your asking.

TimberTech Radiance Rail with IPE as a top rail. I'm trying to determine what would be the best way to connect the IPE to the rest of the railing, the only contact the top rail makes is the posts. I'm thinking of just screwing down the top rail into the 4x4 PT posts and plugging.

What were you thinking of doing?

P.S. I'm using a 5 3/8 IPE railcap and found that when you set the railcap over the radiance rail post slips, it doesn't completely cover them - you have approx 1/16-1/8 of the post slip edge showing (on either side). The overall width of rail cap is actually wider then the post slip, but the profile of the rail cap cuts in making the bottom side a little just a little too narrow to completely cover the rail.

I can take a picture and show you if you don't already have the prdocut to test with.

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Ipe railing on a trex artisan or timberteck railing system

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john_hyatt

scotkight
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Ipe railing on a trex artisan or timberteck railing system

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john_hyatt

scotkightOriginal Author

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scotkight
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