The fallacy is that pressure treated wood will last almost forever. The truth is that it can rot quite quickly. The post shown here is pressure-treated. It has been in the ground roughly ten years. It is not an anomaly, many of the other posts on this same fence were rotted away. Sometimes this is contributed to by the installer cutting the end off and not treating that. Other times, despite the best of efforts, the wood simply rots. Pressure-treated lumber, such as this, is okay in some applications -- even when buried in soil. Heck, this is a fence post for goodness sakes. But, as an inspector, you sure hate to see pressure-treated posts down in the crawl space buried in two inches of soil. Thanks for stopping by, Steven L. Smith
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Steven, we have posts that look just like these on our privacy fence. Funny they need to be replaced also...... Guess it is about time though, we have been in our property for 15 years so I guess nothing lasts forever....
My understanding that pressure treatmentis not enough to protect the wood. I've seen a lot of post have tar spread around the bottom so the water does not penetrate. One little scar on pressure treatment will allow the moisture to absorb in the wood.
Another thought on wood is that people have a tendency to stack their firewood up against the house. That is a big no no, as the wood destroying insects will hop right out of that stacked lumber and into the house. Just food for thought when taking a listing that has this scenario, be tactful and have them move it a good distance from the dwellings.
We tarred our pressure treated fence posts prior to setting them into the concrete 10 years ago and so far, no rot! If we had less yard to fence, we would have used cedar. Since we fenced about 3/4 of an acre, cedar was not an affordable option.
I have more of a concern with the arsenic that is contained in pressure treated wood leaching into the ground or your skin from sitting on it.....
(I'd like to see inspectors address the arsenic leaching into the ground/ground water...There's an idea for you to write a great blog!)
Thanks for the post!
Lorena
Howdy and evenen there Steven
Its really to bad that a lot of lumber yards tell folks that it will not rot.
Steve, that must be the Faux-Pressure treated stuff you have there:)
Are those posts treated with low pressure?
Or maybe treated with kindness?
Your climate surely mistreats them...
Jay, brings up a good point because there are dozens of "grades" (qualities) of treatment. Some WILL rot----others won't---it usually is not possible for the inspector to know what they are looking at until it looks like the one Steve "posted" (no pun intended). One thing for sure if it decays----the treatment was not very good :)
The quality varies. On the other hand, at my house, I have dug up fences with posts just like that, that I put in the ground 20 years ago, and they look swell.