Most composite manufacturers have attempted to fix this by adding texture and faux wood grain, and in many cases, they have had some success. Oil and water do not mix, and when this is attempted, you get a very slippery surface. What is plastic? It is an oil based product. This constant bombardment day in and day out will result in a boardwalk that needs to be replaced rather quickly. Plastic also retains its heat longer, and even after the sun goes down, the boardwalk will still be hot, and that plastic will continue to break down. Suddenly your boardwalk is very hot, and it smells like… well, burned plastic. Some variants will exude their oils, some will let off gas byproducts, but all of them will weaken over time. In addition to the discomfort factor, when plastic heats up, it breaks down. Once you burn your feet, you probably won’t do it again. I wouldn’t recommend walking barefoot on any boardwalk for many reasons, but it happens. Again, while this may be fine in your shaded or partially shaded backyard, a seaside boardwalk is in direct sunlight all day long. Plastic is notorious for retaining heat and getting very hot in direct sunlight. Some manufacturers use an outer shell of pure polyethylene (the same stuff used in water bottles), while others blend the plastic in with the wood flour (ground up wood product). Image courtesy of Heat Build upĬomposite Decking is essentially plastic. As we will see in the points below, damaging the outer core of composite decking can be catastrophic, and this lower hardness practically ensures that damage will occur in such high traffic conditions. While this medium hardness may be fine for your backyard where a couple people walk across it daily, imagine the damage wrought by hundreds of thousands of people walking across a boardwalk each day. Ipe and Cumaru decking are almost 10 times harder than composite products. Wood vs Composite Decking Mediocre Hardness In the end, I think you will see that the best choice is natural wood, probably something like Cumaru or Ipe. But I hope to be able to lay out some serious concerns about using a composite decking product (regardless of manufacturer) in a boardwalk application. Working for a lumber company, I obviously have already firmly announced my opinions on which is the better product. I’m not going to try and pretend I’m unbiased in this ongoing fight between tropical decking and composite decking. Unfortunately, pressure is being brought to bear on city planners from environmental lobby groups to use composite decking to rebuild the boardwalks. When “boardwalk season” comes around, new construction bids and RFQs are on everyone’s minds. Whether the catalyst is a hurricane or just age, these monstrous projects keep coming up. It seems that every year another boardwalk is being replaced.
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