Installing NEW Fir Floors and can’t get a tight fit!
Hello,
I am installing about 1000 sqft of 3/4 x 5 1/4 t&g fir floors. Now, I did get an extremely good price on the wood and now I know why. It seems that a number of the boards have 1/16 and some even an 1/8 difference in there finished face. This is creating an issue on the install as I am not able to get a super tight fit on all of the seams, obviously leaving me with 1/16 to 1/8 gaps.
I’m kind of thinking that some gaps are fine with these floors as they have more of a rustic feel to start with. I was hoping to get some advice on how I might be able to fill these in before or while finishing the floors? epoxy resin, wood fillers etc. that can the be sanded with the floors and stained?
Any thoughts on any steps of this project would be appreciated.
Replies
I probably don't need to mention this.........
and I don't know the cut on your flooring, but with narrower fir flooring (porch floor) around here in Oh, there is a top and bottom (no side is relieved). The top is wider than the bottom-so, gaps pop up if you don't lay it sunny side up.
The top is thicker when viewed from the end.
If the above is incorrect, I'd caution going to the trouble of fill-most seasonal changes will lose alot of your effort.
Well, let's call that "character grade" flooring
I can see from the one photo that the grain varies quite a bit, and there's a lot of sapwood... so I would not necessarily expect high-quality milling, well-dried material, or anything else that should be standard with expensive material.
One thing you can do is to check each piece for width, and start making your courses up using pieces that end-match nicely. It's more work, since you can't just grab whatever board is closest and slam it in there. You would have to shift down to low gear and tediously measure and group your material.
Before it's sanded, you can "goop" it with floor filler, but I would be worried that you'll end up with the stuff coming loose in long, narrow slices. I'd try to make the install look good and minimize the filler.
That looks like a cabin grade material to begin with. The doifferent kinds of grain make it likely that it dried and shrank - or swelled, at differring rates depending on grain of each piece.
When I install flooring with poor milling mis-matches, I use my plane tom ake it fit and or do some sorting/selecting as I work.
Calvin is right about the way flooring is milled. The groove has the two flanges. The bottom flange in T&G flooring is smaller than the upper, unlike with regular T&G. It is possible a small poor shop milled with a regular bit instad.
Be that as it may, you already have it laid now. The fix is to sand the floor, then mix the sawdust you save from sanding, mix some with the oil or poly you will use for finish to make a paste and use that for filler. Let it dry, then sand again to the finsh level and finish the surface.
Do what Piff said, but be prepared to revisit with the same technique at about the six month and 12 month interval. That "cabin grade" planking (I love that term BTW) will be sure to shrink, and you'll have some cracks to fill.
Nonetheless, you'll have an attractive floor, at an affordable price.
Our current dining room table top is an exact example of this....$40 worth of SPF 2X4 lumber. But yep....it shrunk like crazy after a few months.