wide board flooring

[bman]

new question guys
wide boards for flooring let's say 5-10 " t/g 3\4 stock would tounge nailing be enough or would i have to face nail all the boards ? .....this would be on a plywood sub w\rosen paper .... would cupping be a problem :eusa_thin

:eusa_booh in my older age i have gotten smarter to ask before i leap in the past it was full speed ahead with mixed results :BangHead: :BangHead: :BangHead:

barry

 

[Sweetgum]

Personally, I wouldn't go wider than 6". Wider than that, unless of course you use quatersawn stock ($$$$ at that width) and cupping will likely be a problem, IMHO.

 

[jeff...]

Depending on the look your after - I personally love the old look of pegged plank floors (round hole / sq peg) you could use the round hole to screw the board down to the subfloor and cover with a round or sq plug. You might could even consider some kind of contrasting wood for your plugs. Your going to have to sand it after installation anyways so you could flush up the plug at that time.

If your going with QS then I woud not be to conserned with cupping after the lumber is dry. QS lumber will draw up more along the thickness of the board where as flat sawn will draw up more along the width of the board, it's width shrinking that creates internal stress resulting in cupping. if your thinking about going with QS, I persoanlly would start with 5/4 rough cut before kiln drying that is if your after a full inch or 7/8 finished board. 5/4 rough cut should float around an actual thickness of 1 3/8 inch and I would think should be plenty thick enough for a 1" finished board once kiln dried. You might have a few (small precentage) that cull at 1" but I would think all of them should plan out to 7/8.

Others who are familure with this topic please correct me if I mis-stated anything here.

Thanks

 

[scsmith42]

There were some great discussions about this topic on Woodweb about a year ago. The folks that seemed to have the best results with wide plank flooring were going with rather thin boards (2/4 milled, and planed to 3//8"), and glueing them down to the subfloor! Here is the link with pix (read the whole thing; it doesn't get into the glueing option until about halfway through):

Glued-Down Wide Pine Flooring

Seems counterintuitive, but these were professional installers and they swore by the technique.

HOWEVER - most of them were located in the northern part of the US, and I don't know if the regional differences in heat / humidity would come into play.

Personally, I like the wide boards. I go up to 6" in my heart pine floor, and would love wider boards. If I ever expand the house, I'll go wider and glue them down.

 

[NCPete]

the only time we would dare glue down hardwoods when I was installing was when playing with the 'engineered' hardwoods, read that as plywood with a 1/8" thick appearance/wear veneer layer.



sorry, we did glue down hardwood parquet floors all the time. but that works a little differently than planks

 

[jeff...]

I'm no floor installer by any means but I would think if it were some kind of ply wood or composite core it might be ok to glue down, but I am highly suspect of doing this with solid wood.

My 2 cents worth again take it for what it's worth.

 

[bman]

don't believe i will be doing any gluing.... wood has to move....did i mention that there is a fire place Masonry/wood burning in one of the rooms we been know to get it stoked pretty good on cold nights don't think that the wife will go for the wide boards ....she would call that a barryisum ........i mentioned those pegs and she got that deer in headlights look on her face

 

[NCPete]

barry, been talking with Scott via PM, the glue makes more sense than I had originally thought.... The resin paper should prevent it from adhering to the floor, allowing for movement of the wood, independent of the subfloor. Your flooring material would not glue to the floor, but itself, kind of like a floating floor, the normal method for laminates... does it make sense now?

 

[jeff...]

barry, been talking with Scott via PM, the glue makes more sense than I had originally thought.... The resin paper should prevent it from adhering to the floor, allowing for movement of the wood, independent of the subfloor. Your flooring material would not glue to the floor, but itself, kind of like a floating floor, the normal method for laminates... does it make sense now?

Does to me anyways, thanks for the heads up Pete nice follow up :icon_thum

 

[bman]

so we are talking edge gluing than ...i need to go back and read that article

 

[bman]

Scott
thanks for the link does raise some questions from what i gather they were gluing the whole floor to the sub-floor but using very thin materials which may be the way to go material would go a lot further how would thin material ..lets say 2/4 hickory do in your kiln

 

[Kyle]

> 6" requires skill and good labor. I went with a 6" FACE #1 common cherry for my house. It still requires a 7" 1/8 pre-molding cut and finishes out to the 6" face. personally I would never glue any floor down unless engineered .