Code Question

[John_C]

The homeowner for whom I'm working wants me to build a narrow deck along one side of his house.  It will be about 3-1/2' wide, really just a walkway.  His property is so steep, rock strewn and muddy that it's not a bad idea.

A short section of the joist header is exposed where I ripped out a small rotting deck, but the rest is covered with stone.  The stone was set directly on the non pressure treated wood... no building paper, no lathe, nada.  It has hung in there for twenty years but is very loosely attached.  If I try to drill through that to attach a ledger I am sure it will all be on the ground.  In my  mind that might well be a good thing but I don't think the homeowner would agree. 

My idea is to build the walkway as a stand alone, with ~ 3" - 6" between the walkway and the house.  It could be built as a series of 4' - 6'  sections each one stepping down with the grade and staying 12" - 18" above grade which would not require handrails.   He's spent 4 mo. deciding how we should do railings and balusters on the stairs, landing, porch extension I built in the fall, so I doubt we'd ever get around to this "less important" railing.

I'm looking for any feedback before I bounce the idea off the homeowner.  I've got one more day tearing apart and then we will discuss it over the weekend.

Good idea, bad idea, any code considerations.  The owner isn't at all concerned with the code, but we have a building inspector living a few hundred yards up the road.  I try not to build stuff that screams "violation".

[Redoverfarm]

John I am not that familar with code as we have none here but the idea of a stand alone walkway would be better for the situation with the house wall.  If it is permissible to not leave the gap so large it sould be better.   On the safety standpoint one might get their foot stuck between the house and the walkway.  Only need enough to allow water to pass between 1-2".  Well thats mine $1.00 stand minus 98 cents.

[John_C]

That's a good point.  If I go that route I'd want to put the posts far enough away from the house to miss the footer.  The joists and decking could go closer to the house.  I'm home for lunch and I've got another two hours or so of tearing down.  Then I can step back and ponder the situation.  We are going to tear out the badly installed french drain and try to come up with a better plan to keep water out of the crawlspace.  That may expose a section of footing so I can get an idea of what it is like. Last week I was working under the house and there is a lot of footing inboard of the house line.  Either it's a very wide footing or the house is sitting on the outboard edge. 

Back to the salt mines 

[fishing_guy]

We did this 15 years ago when building a ramp for my mother-in-law...supported one side on the front concrete steps, then poured footers for the rest.  After she passed on, we decided to fill in between the house and the ramp.  A couple of more footers, and came within an inch of the house. 

It is still standing strong.

[Redoverfarm]

May be a bad footer layout.  I have even seen some that the block work overhangs two corners (diagonal) and the other two are the same except to the inside.  I guess the contractor never heard of a diagonal measurment to get it square.

[John_C]

The builder of this house didn't hear about a lot of things.

The afternoon session didn't go so well.  When I got to removing the ledger for the far end of the old deck the rim joist was rotted for 6' or so.  It's a log home and a few sections of the bottom course of logs also have some rot.

I won't be able to talk to the owner until tomorrow or possibly Saturday, but I may have to jack the thing up and do some more serious surgery.  Been there, done that, didn't want to do it ever again. I replaced the rim joists and sills on a two story log house that I owned in 2004.  Those rascals are heavy.