Maintaining a Deck

NEW DECKS
If you have a new deck, and it's clean, see Sealing below. Cleaning with Deck Cleaner or brightening with Born Again, Sun Frog’s preparatory products, are usually not needed.

OLDER DECKS
If you have an older, existing deck, you probably are aware that it doesn’t look as good as it could. Decks accumulate dirt, bear foot traffic, suffer standing water for prolonged periods and get beat up by the Sun. They need protection. Providing protection means providing up-front MAINTENANCE (work and products) that will leave your wood with the ingredients that help it fend off these forces of attack while looking better all the while.

Step 1. Cleaning

Don’t seal a dirty deck, especially with a transparent finish/sealer like we make. If you want your deck to LOOK THE BEST, first use our Deck Cleaner, a strong detergent cleaner to remove dirt, mildew, weathered wood fibre and as much of old, pre-existing sealers as may be there as possible. While our deck cleaner is not a "stripper"(which you will need to use from another vendor if you have semi-transparent, solid body stains or deck paints pre-existing that you may want to remove), our Deck Cleaner does a great job at getting a natural wood deck clean and its wood ready to accept our sealer.

Quick Instructions: Add deck cleaner to warm water(filling a bucket in a bathtub works great!), place on the deck with a sprayer, pad, mop or deck brush, let sit 3-5 minutes, then scrub with a stiff brush adding additional Deck Cleaner solution as necessary to break the "gunk" and get your wood clean. Rinse with water.

Step 2. Brightening

If you want your deck, siding, fencing or other existing natural wood to LOOK THE BEST, next use our Born Again to reverse darkened tannin staining. Darkened tannins, when sealed, darken further. For the nearest-original look possible (without physically sanding the weathered and darkened surface layer off), our Born Again product brightens the wood.
Quick Instructions: One gallon of Born Again used as it comes out of the bottle will brighten about 150 square feet of decking or other exterior wood. Do not apply to dry wood. Wet wood first- Born Again does not need to soak into the wood, just to brighten its surface. It can be diluted up to 4:1 with water while still being effective though in a diluted form leaving it on the surface for more minutes is necessary to achieve similar results. Apply with a brush, sprayer, roller, pad or mop. Let stand for several minutes, then rinse well with water.

Born Again is an acid based solution and care must be used to avoid personal contact. It can also damage (burn) plants so if spillage occurs, rinse well and immediately.
Whether you have opted to use Born Again or not, after rinsing your deck or other exterior wood it is imperative that you allow your wood to re-dry before sealing with Sun Frog’s oil based sealers. Oil and water don’t mix and in sealing you want your wood to absorb as much sealer oils as possible so SEAL DRY WOOD ONLY! When your wood has been cleaned and possibly brightened, and allowed to re-dry, you will have maximized its thirst for liquids. When our oil based sealers are applied, it will absorb them the best, in the largest quantity (which bodes well for initial beauty as well as long term performance) and will result in the best performance and aesthetic improvement.
Remember: Preparation is KEY to the best in product performance and aesthetic beauty enhancement. Spend time, effort and money on preparation. The end result will be worth it.

SEALING

Apply a wet coat of Sun Frog’s sealer with a brush, pad, roller or sprayer (if sprayed, use a NIOSH

approved respirator as air-borne oil and solvent ingredients can damage lung tissue. Spraying is not recommended). Work well into wood. If the wood will accept more, apply more. On Decks, benches and other horizontal surfaces where non-penetrating excess has no option but to puddle or dry on top of the wood, after an hour or so of "dry time" lightly buff surface to remove wet excess. This will have allowed what will penetrate to penetrate, while removing surface excess. By leaving minimal surface excess your deck will dry the quickest, look the best, weather the best, and a year or two from then not have an excess which either looks bad or requires additional effort to clean off before re-sealing. Seal you deck with as much product as will be absorbed, leaving as little on top of the wood as possible. This will then look the best, both initially and over its term, and be the easiest to re-do when weather, time and other exterior elements have gotten to it.

Maintain and Existing Deck || Frequently Asked Questions