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Hardwood Floors – nails vs. staples

NCbubba | Posted in Construction Techniques on August 26, 2003 12:09pm

hello all,

we are about to install 1100 sq ft of #1 red oak 2 1/4 strip upstairs in a remodel job.  when i look on the internet to compare pneumatic floor staplers vs. manuel or pneumatic cut nailers, i am am only getting the advice from people trying to sell their particular product.  i  have read that the 2″ long staples with the 1/2″ crown (common in the pneumatic floor staplers) will loosen up and cause the floors to buckle over time.  this info is from people trying to sell a pneumatic nailer that uses the typical “L” shaped nail common to the manuel floor model.

Q:  has anyone had a hardwood floor buckle when using the staple type floor nailer?  thanks for any help.

bubba

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  1. abw12 | Aug 26, 2003 04:05am | #1

    Hi,

    I don't know if this'll help at all, but I installed a prefinished red oak floor in the upstairs foyer of my parents house a little over one year ago. The local lumber store I rented from had a pneumatic stapler, which seems to have worked fine. The floor still looks great.

    Earlier this year I installed another floor in my uncle's house up north...the supplier he used rented a pneumatic nailer (L shaped).

    Supposedly the glue on the staples melts as you put it in, and my supplier told me that it is what all the contractors around here use. BUT, the one difference I noticed is that if you made a mistake with the stapler, it wasn't too much trouble to pull the board out. With the nails, since they have the barbed edge, I had to put up a fight. Sooo, I suppose the nails may hold better.

    (One problem I have with BOTH is that there's no view finder. Sometimes I'd find that I had just "fastened" the last two rows with absolutly no hardware! When they run out they dent the wood, and from a distance it just looked like the head of a nail/staple. I quickly learned to just continually put in a new strip of fasteners, as soon as they fit.)

    -Alex

  2. calvin | Aug 26, 2003 04:30am | #2

    In a pneumatic, all I've used is the bostich stapler.  In the 1/2 dozen floors over the last few years (there's your disclaimer) I have not had a problem with boards buckeling.  As the previous post mentioned, pulling a board isn't much work, however that is if you pry it out and away from the field.  Straight up is much more difficult.  There are a couple of flooring mechanics on the board that I'm sure can give you an opinion with alot more miliage.

    Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.

    Quittin' Time

    1. DavidR8 | Aug 26, 2003 05:06am | #3

      FWIW, I am not a floor mechanic but have done approx 1200+ ft in my house & 400+ in a friends house. My house stapled, 2" Duofast (with a view to the staple magazine so I could tell when it was empty) friends house nailed with a Bostich nailer using 2" L-shaped cleats, (I think they are actually called cleats) I tended to over staple my floor mainly because it was a pneumatic stapler therefore very easy vs. the manual nailer. Doing the manual nailer routine once in my lifetime is waaaay enough for me. Also note that I was using select & better grade so the lengths allowed us to virtually fly along vs. the shorts we used on my friends floor where two cleats per piece was mandatory and chewed up a lot of time.

      2+ years on my stapled floor and no issues at all with buckling etc. Ditto for my friends floor.

      Your mileage may vary...

  3. luvmuskoka | Aug 30, 2003 03:12pm | #4

    Fastening tools are preference items. I prefer staples.

    If you use pneumatic tools everyday you can "hear" when the magazine is low. When it is actually empty a deaf person can hear the tool banging louder.

    Buckling is always  caused by excessive moisture in the house (in relation to moisture content of the flooring). Improper fastening (too tight) can exacerbate the problem.

    Flooring should be fastened every 10". No more-No less, regardless of fastener choice.

    Ditch

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