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Please advise on your preferred method for nailing quarter-round. Shall I shoot into both the base trim and into the floor? I’ll employ my 15 gauge nailer. Thanks for your help.
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If your base trim is made from real wood (not MDF or ply), it will tend to expand/contract in width as the humidity varies throughout the year. The purpose of the shoe is to cover gaps between the floor and the bottom of the base and to hide the seasonal shrinkage of the base as it "rises" off the floor.
If you were to shoot the "shoe", or quarter-round, to just the baseboard, it would rise off the floor as the base contracts in width, showing a gap between the bottom of the shoe and the floor. Not good.
Were you to shoot the shoe to both the base and the floor, the shoe may split as it is pulled away from the floor by the same seasonal contraction of the base. Also bad.
Option number three? Shoot the shoe to the floor only. As the base contracts, the baseboard will slide up behind the shoe, showing no gaps and hiding all wood movement. Good.
Keep in mind that you may want to prefinish the base prior to installing the shoe. Otherwise when the base shrinks up from behind the shoe you may get a small strip of unstained/unpainted baseboard just above the shoe. Not good, either.
Mongo
*I should have mentioned that the floor is an 85 year old oak T&G floor (typical modern strip widths). Still shoot to floor?Thanks.
*Yep , Mongo is right on the money .
*KAS,The traditional molding for your application is 1/2" x 3/4" base shoe. True quarter rounds usually 3/4 quarter rounds are occasionally used but, I believe that it is a less desirable choice. True base shoe is not that easy to shoot into the floor because the top radiused edge can and sometimes will deflect a gun fired nail. Most base shoe is nailed diagonally into the crack between the basboard and floor and hits almost nothing. Keep your hand away from the gun when you shoot those moldings down.Joe
*Uh, yes, and be careful nailing cove at steep angles, same reason. :)