Outdoor wood railings

I have no idea where you are from, so I don't know what is available in your area.

Redwood, I work in the northeast.Long Island N.Y. We see all four seasons.Hot humid summers(Not this year so far) and Cold clammy winters.(every year) Doug

Clem, is that real or is it Deck Tools at work.

I love the post caps on the intermediate post. Did you get that on the first try?

If the decking is ipe, we almost always use a ipe cap, preferably the milled 2x6 cap. Normally are posts and rails are a top grade of redwood, that is still less then 1/2 the price of ipe, and makes a nice contrast. Deckorators or 2x2 CAH redwood are the usual balusters.

Clem,
I'm assuming you coped that rail into the cap, nice work. What did you use to cope the end?

Doug,

We use mahogany and have great results. Cost less than ipe and easier on your tools too. Just did a deck and railings out in East Marion on the sound. The HO liked the reddish color of mahogany with Cabots timber oil vs the brownish color of ipe. Riverhead Building Supply has a great selection of mahogany and ipe at a good price. They even stock 4x4 in both.

Clem, great workmanship on the tie in between the post cap and rails. Really like that look. How did you do it?

Thanks guys....Beutifull work. John looks like I will hit riverhead building supplies this afternoon. Doug

to answer everyone's question - it was a pain in the nuts. the owner bought the rail after we had the posts done, and the rail was just shy of covering the top. the long runs are mitered to the center of the board, then there is a filler cut from the same profile, then another "to center" miter and so on. was very time consuming given the density of ipe and the fact that the rail is rabbeted to accept the balusters. everything biscuited together and glued (major pain with the biscuits). there were a few more caps like that around the house, and every one was a big deal because some were at the bottom of stair runs and so on.

as far as using different species, i'm not really a deck guy so i'm not that familiar with pro's and con's. never worked with redwood (not readily available in this part of the states). cedar and mahogany are fairly common and easy to get here so I've worked with both with good results.

Wow looks great. Only question is won't swelling and shrinking with weather changes be an issue

naturalwood said:

Wow looks great. Only question is won't swelling and shrinking with weather changes be an issue

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ipe is very dense and relatively stable. it does need to be sealed right away though. we had to re-do a couple of these caps as they weren't sealed in a timely fashion.

ClemS said:

we had to re-do a couple of these caps as they weren't sealed in a timely fashion.

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That would blow...they look great:thumbsup:

Clems, those post caps look sweeet!:thumbsup:

thanks for all the "wows" gentlemen. very glad everyone likes my trim work especially since it really isn't what i do a great deal of. :thumbup:

I have to chime in, those are some really nice looking ipe rails, especially the cap deal on top of the post. I bet your framing is nice & tight like that too.