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PSA: A guy at the lumber yard in Tacoma saved my whole deck build with one sentence
I was about to buy 16 foot boards for my deck frame because I thought fewer joints meant a stronger build. A guy loading lumber next to me in Tacoma looked at my list and said, if you use 16s on 2x8 joists you will fight a crown on every single one. He told me to go with 12s and cut them so the crown faces up. I shrugged it off at first, then I watched him flip a board and show me how the gap opened under a straightedge. I switched my whole order that day and spent about $60 more on extra boards, but every joist sat flat on the beam with almost no shimming. Two weekends later the frame was dead level across all 14 feet and I had zero squeaks when I walked the deck. I had been fighting bowed boards for years and just thought it was normal wood. Curious if anyone else orders shorter stock on purpose just for the crown, or do you all deal with 16s and shim it out?
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