Introduction

If you install them properly, joist hangers will keep your decks and floors strong as wood dries, twists, shrinks and ages. We'll show you a four-step method for installing joist hangers that will ensure that your floor or deck stays flat and strong. So the next time you hold a square dance or weight-lifting contest on your deck, you'll rest easier knowing you used joist hangers and installed them the right way.

Select the Best Beam Hanger for the Job

Figure A: Standard joist hanger

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This standard 2×8 joist hanger will keep your joists solidly and permanently connected. The double shear hanger in Photo 4 is another common type. Selecting the correct joist hangers and hanging (or “setting”) them is pretty straightforward. We’ll show you a four-step method for installing joist hangers that will ensure that your floor or deck stays flat and strong—and meets the requirements of your building inspector and the joist hanger manufacturer.

Joist hangers come in many sizes to support different dimensional sizes of lumber and I-joists. The beam hangers you’ll find at home centers typically have a galvanized coating and will work indoors and out. Most homeowners will use the common face-mounting type (Fig. A), but specialized hangers are available for unusual situations, such as building in a corrosive salt-air environment or joists that run at an angle.

The performance specifications for each type of beam hanger are carefully engineered and tested to meet the approval of local building codes. For the performance they deliver and their installation speed, joist hangers are a bargain. Joist hangers are sold according to the size of joists or beams they fit and their load capacity. Home centers and lumberyards typically stock the most common hangers and can order the oddball types and sizes. They also distribute simple and informative brochures that tell you which beam hanger to buy for which use (like for building a small deck). For bigger projects, pick up a free joist hanger product catalog that lists each manufacturer’s hanger types and their uses and load ratings. These catalogs list phone hotlines for engineering help. Manufacturers won’t design your project for you, but they’ll answer technical questions about specific joist hangers.

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