You may want to consider using a different brand. I built a planter for my garden with LifeTime Lumber and it works great. It is VERY stiff, and it is not water soluble, so it will not decompose. Also, LifeTime Lumber is garden friendly, since it does not release toxins into the soil. http://www.ltlumber.com/ I built my planter on the balcony so that my dog would have a little grass to play on and it has a small aquarium in it to. Just Goldfish, since they are pretty tough and cheap to replace in case they die. Still sad when they die, though. :( Here is a link that might be useful: LifeTime Lumber

I did this on my small side porch (roughly 100 sq/ft) a couple years ago, and have had no problems. I went with pressure treated lumber because of a tight budget on the porch, and can't comment on the fake wood. Here's what I did though. 1. I ripped several deck planks in half which left me with ~1 1/8" x ~2 1/2" pieces. I did not use 2x4's because of clearance issues. But the ripped planks work fine, and are cheaper if you have a table saw (heck a circular saw will work). 2. I attached the ripped planks to the concrete with tapcons. (concrete screws) 3. I attached the decking to the now secure "sleepers/stringers/nailers" with stainless DECKING SCREWS. No nails here. 4 . Around the front and sides I repeated the process only I attached 2x12's as facia. People who don't know there's a concrete porch under the wood never DO know until I tell them. They just think I have build the most solid wooden porch on the planet. As long as the patio is pitched slightly for drainage you won't have moisture issues. It's a little work doing this. It's a lot of drilling with a hammer drill, but aside from that it's nothing out of the ordinary. Definitely less work than building a conventional wood deck. No more than an afternoons work for 350 sq/ft A couple tips though..... Get ahold of a hammer drill, or 2 if you have help. You can probably rent them from HD, or similar. A regular drill with masonry bits will take forever, and cordless hammer drills will eat batteries all day. Don't use nails. some woods/plastic won't cup but PS will, and I've seen it pull nails and loosen in a hurry. Stainless screws are the way to go, unless you use some hidden fastener system which I know nothing about. This isn't rocket science, and is really not a hard project. It's not as easy as laying the deck board on the concrete, not fastening them, and calling it a deck, but I'm sure it holds up a lot better. like I said, it's an afternoons work at worst. Whether you do it yourself, or hire someone to do it.

I bought the ACQ and the "TufCote" screws from one of the largest and most reputable lumber mills in town. I asked THEM which screws to use with my wood decking -- then the second time with the Trex as well. I wanted to do it right. They had thought the cause of the ACQ decking cupping and snapping screws was a due laying down very wet decking during a very hot period with full southern exposure. They felt the combination just baked the wood and offered me a slight discount on the Trex. I even had a rep from Simpson some out to look at my deck and they offered me more coated trimheads! So now I have a resurfaced Trex decking with screws ready to fail again? How bad do you think it would mess up the decking to unscrew the coated trim heads and replace them with a stainless steel at this point? Not sure if it would chew up the Trex. Do you think I need to replace every screw or maybe just 1 per joist? I may be about to unscrew them, replace with SS and pound the material in place... ah, what a nightmare! At least I didn't use TrapEase scews which you can't back out. Looks like I need to have a meeting with the lumber mill.

I have had my trex about 7-10 years I am guessing. I was so excited, maint. free and all. Boy was I wrong. Still looks nicer than any wood deck but need to clean mold/mildew twice yearly is a pain and I have a very large deck. Today for the first time I used a power washer on low pressure with the cleaner that came with it "G Clean", didn't do much as far as I'm concerned, for mold mildew etc, NOT. Its cleaner but all mildew/mold spores are still there so i thought I am going to try a test area with vinegar/baking soda and see what that does, pretty much nothing again. I can deal with the way it looks as the spotting doesn't show when dry so thats good but I am looking into prevention more than anything now. Any luck out there? I want to stay as organic as possible and may just do vinegar and baking soda and see how it goes. Not feeding the mold/mildew is probably better than anything. I live in MN which can be very wet at times and my deck is East facing primarily with some South sun as it passes on by to set in the West. I love everything about my trex except the mold issues http://www.maids.com/blog/3-non-toxic-ways-to-clean-mold/