If you want to know, Can you stain a damp deck, then this short article will show you how to go about staining your deck if it’s damp…
Here’s what you need to know…
The truth is, you can’t stain a damp deck…
And you can’t stain a wet deck either…
If you try to stain a deck while it’s still damp then the stain won’t be able to soak into the timber properly and you’ll end up with an uneven or blotchy coat of stain…
And worse than that, the dampness will get trapped in your deck boards and will cause your deck stain to prematurely fade and peel…
You’ll want to make sure your deck is completely dry before you apply any stain to it…
Now with all that said…
I know that sometimes you really need to get that deck stain on but your deck is wet and it’s taking way too long to dry…
In the colder months, I’ve gone days where the deck has stayed damp…
Or sometimes the weather has turned cold and it rains in the morning that I’m going to stain a deck…
I show up ready to stain the deck but there’s pools of water soaking into the deck…
It’s way too wet to stain…
The thing is, sometimes you really need to stain that deck…
Lucky for you, there’s a way around it…
If your deck is damp and you need to stain it, here’s what you should do…
This is a breakdown of what I do when I have to stain a deck and it’s wet…
The truth is, there’s no perfect conditions to stain a deck…
It’s either too hot, too cold or it’s too wet…
You can’t win…
So sometimes in this deck staining business, you’re gonna have to cheat…
This is my cheat code below…
1. Sweep off any excess water from your deck…
The idea here is to sweep off as much water as possible…
Getting rid of the larger pools of water, speeds the drying process…
2. Mop up any pools of water with rags…
After you sweep the water from your deck, it’ll still be pretty wet…
Grab yourself a bag of rags and start soaking up as much of the water as possible…
By now you won’t see any pools of water but your deck will still be damp…
3. Blow fans on large areas of the damp deck…
You can hire a couple of fans…
And let them blow over your damp deck…
This will dry them up pretty quickly…
But you’ll still notice some areas are still damp…
4. Use a heat gun for smaller damp sections…
This is when I like to grab my heat gun out and use it to dry up those sections of the deck that are taking longer to dry…
Hold the heat gun on a damp section for around 10 minutes and you’ll see it dry before your eyes…
Now your deck should be completely dry and ready to stain…
But do this one thing first…
5. Check the weather conditions…
Make sure it’s not about to rain…
You don’t want to stain your deck for it to rain an hour later…
This won’t be a good situation…
So make sure the weather is clear…
6. Stain your deck…
Congratulations…
You did it!!
Your deck is dry and now you can stain it…
But before you do, make sure you know how to stain your deck properly…
Is this perfect?
No, definitely not!!
But if you don’t dry your deck and you try to stain it while it’s damp, you’ll be stripping your deck back in a couple of months and doing it again…
The other thing is, your deck could get damaged waiting for the perfect conditions…
So we need to dry it off ourselves and get that stain on there…
Make sense?
Ok great…
Now the method I showed you above is the minimum you should do…
The weather will always mess you around when you try to stain your deck…
Just realise that…
So don’t get “fed up” and decide to stain your deck when it’s still damp…
You will regret it…
What happens if you stain a wet deck?
See this deck here?
This is a deck that I was called out to fix up…
The owner decided to stain their deck in the middle of winter and the deck was still damp before they applied the stain…
You can see the black blotches sitting under the deck stain…
Here’s this same deck after I stripped it back and dried it out properly…
Big difference right?
There’s no black blotches trapped under the stain…
No amount of stain will cover the ugly blotches on this deck…
And the sad truth is, when you rush and stain a wet deck, the stain can’t adhere to the deck properly and it will peel and fade within 6 months…
That’s why you should never stain a wet deck…
But there;s a little twist to this whole staining a damp deck situation…
There is deck stain that is made to be applied to a damp deck…
Now I’m going to show you a deck stain that actually recommends applying the first coat to a wet deck…
It’s called Spa N Deck …
It’s actually designed to apply the first coat to a wet deck…
But, here’s the thing…
The second and third coat needs to be applied to a dry deck…
Your deck can’t be wet or damp for the next two coats…
So while you can get away with applying the first coat of stain to your deck when it’s damp, the second and third coats still need my “Dry Deck Cheat Codes” that I showed you above…
So the Spa N Deck is far from perfect…
It’s just another option…
But if you’re outside of Australia, I’m not sure you can get this product…
But don’t worry because this isn’t the only deck stain that is designed to be applied to a wet deck…
Restore a Deck can also be applied to a damp deck…
And you can get it if you live in the USA…
So you can also check that deck stain…
But never forget the cheat codes that I showed you…
They’ll save your deck stain…
Even these “cheeky” stains that can be applied to a damp deck…
You’re welcome by the way…
So go forth and get that deck dry then stain it…
Peace,
Jason
Need some Expert Advice?
If you’ve been searching the internet trying to find an answer to a specific deck problem and you’ve found it impossible to get a straight answer…
Why not just reach out and ask me directly for an answer?
I’ve got 10 years of deck knowledge crammed into my noggin. I can pretty much guarantee I’ve got an answer to your problem just rattling around in there…
Come on, don’t be shy…
FAQ’s
No you can’t stain a damp deck. If you do, you’ll trap moisture under the deck stain and it will look patchy and blotchy…
If your deck looks dry ion the surface and it’s been at least 24 to 48 hours, then you know your deck is dry enough to stain. You can speed the drying process with fans…
Ideally, you would wait 24 to 48 hours for your wet deck to dry before staining, but in the dryer months, or if you dry your deck with fans, you may only need to wait half a day…
You can dry your deck faster by sweeping off excess water, mopping up pools of water with rags and then using large fans to blow air across your deck…
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