Tired of mixing concrete for sonotubes? If a North Carolina entrepreneur gets his way, deckbuilders will soon be buying pre-engineered, precast footings off the shelf. The Deck Plug is a flat, cylindrically shaped lightweight footing that's designed for decks and other small projects. The concept behind the Deck Plug is simple: Dig a posthole whose base lies beneath the frost line, drop in a deck plug, and you're in business. I asked the product's inventor why I couldn't just pour my own plugs in the basement using plastic drywall buckets. His reply was that the Deck Plug is more than just a slab of concrete. For instance, concrete is seldom mixed correctly in the field and is usually put under
