Hi folks, just want your opinion on wood floors. Pre finished versus not, real wood nailed down versus engineered nailed or glued down. It is a remodel over plywood. I am 50 with no kids so it doesn’t need to last forever. (I won’t last that long, LOL) Also how about wood in the kitchen? Thanks for your thoughts…Pamilyn
The purpose of Art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls
Replies
Happy Birthday dearie. 1-3 is also my daughter's b-day, but she lags you by a year or two. :)
There are two main advantages to prefinished wood floors: 1 - when the last board is down, the job is done and it can be walked on. 2 - The quality of the finish is usually better and longer lasting, because it was factory applied.
Sand-and-finish flooring takes several days to stain and finish, but you get a smooth floor with much less visible joints.
Wood in the kitchen is ok, as long as you are careful about wiping up spilled water. Now, if you get a leak in the sink or dishwasher, it's a bigger problem.
Since you're going over plywood, I would not use glue-down.
Solid wood vs engineered is, to me, more of a personal and economic question.
Check out this site: hardwoodinstaller.com It is an excellent wood floor forum, and they have good deals on quality material.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
Thanks so much. Thanks for the birthday wish too. Jan 3 is a sucky time to have a birthday. Everyone is so burned out. I will check out that site. Why would you not glue down the floor? PamilynThe purpose of Art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls
Normally I would nail to ply and glue to concrete. or you could float over the ply, but nailing to ply is traditional.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
O.K....boy that site is incredible, thanks so much..PamilynThe purpose of Art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls
Hope it isn't rude to throw in a question of my own.
I'll soon be installing unfinished T & G flooring (milled from reclaimed heart pine) over 3/4" subfloor in my little weekend project that is entering it's 5th year. I'll be using a pneumatic flooring nailer (for the first time) for installation and was wondering if it's necessary to nail over the floor joists instead of just into the plywood.
Assuming the ply is underlayment rated, and well adhered to the joiosts, then all you need to do is drive a nail about every 6-8 inches regardless of where it falls.
A 2" flooring nail, driven through 3/4" flooring into 3/4" subfloor, only extends about 3/8" so even if you did hit a joist it wouldn't make much difference.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
NOFMA (the National Oak Flooring Man. Assoc.) says to install floors with 10-12" between nails and to have at least 2 nails per board.
That said, I like to nail mine with one on the floor joist and the second in the middle of the joists, however NOT because I want to hit the joist, but because I want to keep an even and consistant pattern and this allows me to stay 8" apart. I have never had a call back due to this. It does mean a few more nails and a little time, but it leaves a very consistant floor. This is more important if you have 2 installers and they work opposite ends of the room.
Thanks for the nailing schedule info.Next question: If the flooring is over heated/conditioned space, is a vapor barrier necessary? If so, should the vapor barrier take the form of a coating on the backs of the floorboards or some sort of rolled goods such as roofing felt?
You would go nuts trying to coat the backs of the boards with something.
The tar paper is not a vapor barrier ... it is a vapor retarder. It will prevent (relatively) sudden changes in moiuture passing from one side to the other. A layer of tar paper under the boards is standard practice for some installers.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
Since the practice of using a vapor retarder (tar paper) under the flooring is, I've been told, often to eliminate squeaks more than to retard vapor, and since a few squeaks merely add to the ambiance of an old colonial, I'm leaning toward installing the floorboards directly on the subfloor. Thanks for the feedback.Next question: The flooring to be installed is not tongue and grooved on the ends, only on the edges. Therefore, I plan to make my own T & G using biscuits. Some of the boards are 5" wide and I want to keep the butted end joints stable. Does this sound reasonable? Is this overkill? Should the biscuits be glued in or allowed to float? (If they were T & G, it wouldn't be glued.)
Where did youn get flooring that is not end matched?
I would definately use something to align the ends. Rather than a biscuit joiner, I would use a router with a slot cutting bit, and cut pieces of spline to fit. Flooring companies usually stock spline, sometimes called loose tongues. Or you could make your own by ripping a piece of baltic birch plywood.
No need to glue the biscuits or splines in place.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
> Where did youn get flooring that is not end matched?The flooring came from a company that specializes in reclaiming and milling heart pine from beams rescued from old whiskey warehouses that are being torn down. They say that when they cut the beams for the first time, they can smell where the barrels have leaked and permeated the wood. These areas of the wood come out with a bluish gray stain that adds character to the finished floor.
"Where did youn get flooring that is not end matched?"That typical for wide plank, or reclaimed, or antique, and for long CVG fir. The only real reason for end matching is when shorts started to be a standard offering. Letting in a spline is fine to do, but there are not all that many endjoints when you use these longer lengths of floor ing
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
This sounds a lot like what I'm doing now with a wide plank maple floor. My boards (from Carlisle Wide Plank Flooring in New Hampshire) also came with no end t&g. I've got a slotting bit in the router and quickly swipe each board end with that. I precut a bunch of splines from 1/4" pw (cut to width and length) and after nailing two end-joined boards down I slide a spline into the matching grooves. I'm not glueing the splines.
Since my planks are 6"-9" wide I am following Carlisle's advice and glueing (PL400 or PL Premium) as well as nailing on 8" schedule.
For me, the hardest part so far has been getting tight butt joints. With a wide board like that it's oh-so-easy for the joint to not line up perfectly squarely, either on the chop saw when I cut the ends or on the floor when I nail the board down.
On a some what different tact, but yet related - just completed installing 310 sq. ft. of unfinished oak flooring. Sanded it 2x w/ 36 grit paper, 1x w/ 60, 2x w/ 80 and 2x w/ 100. Upon completion the owner stated that he felt that the floor was "a bit grainy." He immediately then proceded to ask me to run my hand along the top of a table which he finished and stated that, "The floor should feel like this table top". My question, should a sanded and finished floor feel as smooth as a table top?
Thanks,
dlb
.
The undisciplined life is not worth examining.
Sounds to me you went "Above and beyond". I have never had a floor finisher do that much. PamilynThe purpose of Art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls
furniture grade is a step or two above furnitire grade. I might finish a table top to 600 grit but 120 is the best I've ever seen flooring go, many accept 80 as fine, depending on the species and finish.That said the 'feel' of the finish is often in the top coats, not the sanding. If you failed to sand or screen and use the tack clothe bnetwen coats, there could be some sawdust in the finish trapped to give it a rough finish.
Welcome to the Taunton University of Knowledge FHB Campus at Breaktime. where ... Excellence is its own reward!
Maybe its tradition or sentimentality, but I do not like prefinished floors, I think mainly b/c of the v grooves along the edges, which brings me to the point:
If you use your kitchen, flour, crumbs etc. get in the v cracks, and can be hard to clean. Otherwise, I love wooden kitchen floors. I prefer wood everywhere, except bathrooms (powder rooms still ok) as long as its applied, sanded, then finished.
Additionally, I have seen many prefinished floors with a less than ideal finish from the factory.
You can get prefinished wood floors without the v-groove. If we go that way thats what we will use. PamilynThe purpose of Art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls
You need to be real careful about square edge prefinished flooring. If there is any thickness variance in the wood, or the installation, you'll have a sharp corner exposed. it will split off rather quickly, leaving a unfinished and ugly blemish. And before it splits off, it will snag socks and bare feet.
"When asked if you can do something, tell'em "Why certainly I can", then get busy and find a way to do it." T. Roosevelt
Really??? Hmmmm good to know, thanks..PamilynThe purpose of Art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls