If you want to know how to strip your decking back to bare wood, then you found this step by step guide just in the nick of time…

Here’s what you need to know…

The easiest way to strip a decking back to bare wood is by either sanding it back or striping it with a chemical stripper…

Both are great options but they have different benefits and downfalls…

So let’s dig in and find out which is the best way for you…

The two ways to strip decking back to bare wood…

If you didn’t just skip past the intro, you already know the two methods are chemical stripping and sanding…

I do both and they both work…

Which one is better?

Well, that really depends on what you prefer…

It doesn’t matter what I think…

I’m here to help you decide, not to tell you what to do…

You’re an adult, you need to make some decisions for yourself, starting with how you’re gonna strip your decking back to bare wood…

Hey, you’ve gotta start somewhere… 

Don’t worry, I’ll help you to decide…

The new aged chemical strip…

Deck-nology has come a long way in the last few years…

No longer do you have to get down on your hands and knees, break your back just to sand your deck…

Now you can outsource all of the hard work…

But you don’t need to fork out thousands to some overpriced decking company to do it for you…

Just a side note… If you do happen to have a few thousand $$ lying around that you want to part with, I know a really great, over-priced decking company that will gladly take your money…

But NO!!

You don’t need that anymore…

Now you can spray on a harmless little chemical and it will do all of the heavy stripping for you…

Do you wanna see this chemical in action?

You do??

Ok, here’s a picture of it doing its thing…

You can see how the deck stain is starting to soften up and turn to mush…

Yep, mush is the technical term…

Anyway, this is really simple to use…

Let me break it down for you, in 3 simple steps…

1. All you need to do is paint this stuff on your deck…
2. Let it sit for an hour all while keeping it wet with a hose…
3. After an hour, pressure wash it off…

That’s it…

That’s all there is to it…

Well, you’ll still need to touch up a few spots…

You see, some of the old deck stains can be really stubborn and not want to come off…

But you can either repeat steps 1 through 3 again on the stubborn spots or you can get violent and hit them with a 40 grit disc and an orbital sander…

Don’t worry, this isn’t anything like sanding your deck back…

At this point all you need to do is run the 40 grit over it a couple of times and the old stain will be gone…

But, before you do that, you also need to hit your decking with a really potent deck brightener to neutralise the chemicals…

And it also eliminates all of the blackness on your deck and brings the natural colour back…

Then you can remove the stubborn spots with the 40 grit…

Uhhmm, unfortunately that’s not all…

Cause now you also have to run 80 grit over your entire deck to smooth it off ready for deck stain…

So there is a bit involved in this whole process of stripping a deck back to bare wood…

Nothing worth doing is ever easy, right?

Now you know why deck companies charge so much, hey??

Anyway, this method of stripping your deck is actually a lot easier on your body than sanding it is…

And it’s actually a lot easier on your decking boards as well…

Think about this…

Deck boards are usually 19mm thick…

And overtime they warp and bend out of shape…

This means that if you sand them with a machine, you have to level the deck first by sanding across the boards…

And once your deck is level, then you have to sand up and down the boards as well…

Each decking board will get 4 passes under the sanding machine…

That’s a lot of sanding…

If you’re starting with 19mm boards, how thick do you think they’ll be after sanding them back like this?

Now what happens if you need to sand them back again in a couple of years??

How thick are they going to be then?

That’s why they invented a chemical to strip your decking back to bare timber…

It’s so much more gentle than the sanding machines…

Don’t get me wrong…

Sanding is still a great option, you just need to do it a certain way…

And wouldn’t cha know it, that’s the topic of our next section…

Strip decking back using the old school sanding method…

Sanding your deck back to bare wood is the tried and true classic…

Equip yourself with a sander…

Grab yourself some 36 grit sandpaper and get to sanding…

But before you head down to your local store and hire a deck sanding machine, there’s a few things you need to know first…

I never recommend using a deck sanding machine…

Remember I said, if you use a sanding machine on your deck, you’ll need to level your deck before the sanding can take place…

Well, if you don’t level your deck and grind it down, it’s impossible to strip it back properly and this is what can happen…

You can see the sander left behind all of those blotchy marks…

Now the only way to fix this and strip your deck properly is by using a belt sander…

The belt sander will allow you to get right into those low spots without needing to level your deck first…

That’s why I only recommend sanding your deck with a belt sander…

I use a belt sander like this one…

You see, a belt sander will allow you to sand your deck without taking off precious millimetres and making it weak…

Look, no matter how level you think your decking is, it’s not level…

Trust me on this…

The moment you start to sand it with a huge floor sander, you’ll see how it just doesn’t seem to be taking all of the old stain off…

That’s because you need to level it first, then you can sand it properly…

The reason “The Pros” use a sanding machine is because it’s easier for them…

It’s much quicker and they can maximise their profits…

But if you want to strip your decking back to bare wood and keep it strong and healthy at the same time, it’s best you use a belt sander…

The steps to using a belt sander to strip your deck…

1. Strip your decking with 40 grit sandpaper and a belt sander…
2. Get the edges with 40 grit discs and an orbital sander…
3. Smooth your deck using 80 grit sandpaper with an orbital sander…
4. Get those tight corners with a detailed sander and 80 grit…

These 4 steps are all you need to go from this…

To this…

I hope I’ve convinced you to use a belt sander and not a floor sander…

Ok, great…

Now you need to know how to use the belts sander properly…

You see, to get that deck stripped back to bare timber, I had to use two very special sanding techniques…

The thing is, even the belt sander will struggle to remove stain from warped, cupped or uneven decking boards…

That is, unless you use my very simple RoundHouse Method and couple that with The High Skii Technique…

These are the two deck sanding techniques that I created after sanding decks for over 10 years…

If I can’t sand your deck back properly then I can get paid…

If I can’t sand your deck back to the cleanest, barest timber possible then any stain I put on there won’t absorb into the timber properly and will peel off within months…

Then I’ll be on the line for thousands of dollars in repairs…

So out of necessity, my deck sanding methodology was born…

I needed a way to sand a deck back completely without causing any damage…

The thing is, if you come to a low spot, you can’t simply press down harder to sand it off…

NO!

That’s the quickest way to burn black marks into your deck or leave ugly divots and etch marks…

My way is gentle and really effective…

Check this out…

You can see in the video that I kept sanding over and over on the one spot but the sander couldn’t get to it…

That was until I unleashed the beautiful combination of the RoundHouse Method and The High Skii Technique…

If you want to learn how to sand you deck using my methods, head over to the RoundHouse & HIgh Skii Technique page, and I’ll explain how you can steal my hard earned techniques and use them for yourself…

The strip your decking back to bare wood, wrap up…

So there you have it…

The 2 most effective ways to strip a decking back to bare wood…

It doesn’t matter which method you choose, they both work great…

Some people are worried about using a chemical so they go with the belt sander…

Others don’t want to spend all day on their knees so they go with the chemical strip…

Just know that they both take a lot of time to do properly…

And they can both be “killer” on your body…

But you don’t need to do it all in one day…

You can spread it out over a week…

Your back and your knees will thank you…

And with that, we’ve come to the end…

But don’t worry, I’ve got a tonne of other decking information you can sink your teeth into…

For instance, if you want a full breakdown of the basics, like how to install the sanding belts, or which sandpaper to use, then head over to my Deck sanding guide that I so kindly put together just for you…

Ok, it’s there for everyone but you’re the only one here with me right now, so it’s just for you…

I’ll see you on our next adventure…

Peace, 

Jason…