Appreciation post: My boss told me to use a story stick for a big deck job

He said it would save me time on the long runs of railing. I was building a 40 foot deck in Cincinnati last week and thought I could just measure each section. After the third post was off by a quarter inch, I made a stick like he said. It cut my install time in half and everything lined up perfect. Anyone have other simple tricks for keeping long runs straight?

3 comments

3 Comments

lee6273mo ago

Come on, that's just lazy. A tape measure is the right tool for the job. If you're off by a quarter inch, that's on you, not the method. Making a whole stick for one job just adds an extra step and something else to carry around. Real pros measure twice and get it right.

-1

park.riley2mo ago

Yeah I used to be in the same boat as @lee627 honestly. Brought a tape measure everywhere and measured three times before cutting. But then I had to cut 12 identical trim pieces for a window surround and the first one came out perfect and the next two were a hair off even though I measured the same way each time. That's when I finally tried a story stick and it saved me from screwing up the whole batch. Now I only use one when I need multiple copies of the same cut, not for every single thing.

elliotjenkins3mo ago

But a story stick is faster and foolproof for repeating the same cut.