Hi All,
I just ordered some exotic hardwood prefinished flooring (Tiger Wood, Jatoba.) Decided to install it myself.: two rooms, about 200 sq ft per room. I don’t confuse myself with a pro, but I can take my time doing this and I ordered a little extra over and above the normal “extra” in the event I goof. I am taking the current flooring out, making sure the underlayment (3/4 ply) is screwed down and tight, using the proper fastener distances at the edges and the field, rosin paper over the underlayment. (Did I leave anything I left out?)
Here’s the question. If money is not an issue, should I buy the Bostich industrial pneumatic,or the Porta-Nails Hammerhead pneumatic, or doesn’t matter? I know I could rent, but the economics don’t make sense..I do an hour a night, more on weekends in between the other million errarnds, kidstuff, etc., this could take me two weeks before I say “done.” Besides, everybody should have their very own industrial flooring nailer, right?
Replies
Hi Larry, I just got done a few weeks ago putting in about 600 sq.ft. of prefinished Jatoba. It was the hardest and densest(?)floor I've ever done. Burned the wood everytime I cut it in the chopsaw and my blade was great on the next job of oak so it was certainly sharp enough. I used a pnuematic Porter Cable with 2" nails and at least one out of every 15 nails did not sink entirely when it hit a dense spot, I had to keep a hammer and countersink handy. I even cranked the pressure to the max. I don't think you're going to want to do this with a manual floor nailer, this wood is HARD. There was also many many shorts. I will tell you the end result was beautiful, we ran the room on a bias. Good luck and figure a way to get a pnuematic. George.
Larry,
I much prefer staples over cleats. Coated staples will pass thru the tongue with less resitance than a cleat, and will require less psi, hence less split tongues. I've done pullout tests with cleat and staple fastening guns and staples hold much better. Also a staple which doesn't set can be clipped off with nips and the overage bent and set down with a punch. Cleats will often bend when trying to set them by hand.
I attach a small pressure guage right to my nailer so I can make finite adjustments without walking back to the compressor. This is important when nailing exotics,as getting the pressure dead on makes all the difference.
Ditch
Great info! I think I was avoiding the staple approach for the very reason you recommended it - pullout.
Have you ever put down a very hard wood floor, e.g. jatoba, ipe, tiger wood? Sounds like I should watch the depth of the first few staples and adjust the air pressure on my emglo 2 hp down from max until the staples are just flush. Your advice about how to deal with any "proud" staples is definitely going to save me a lot of time and experimenting. Thanks.
remote regulator- great idea.-mike
go pneumatic bostitch parts, o-ring kits are everywhere staples/nails is a toss up staples hold better when trying to demo a bad board, but i don't think that's important as the floor is a stable assembly you don't see properly nailed floors lifting out of place or moving 6-8" nail pattern, will be tight regardless of fastener
may be able to buy once used bostitich stapler, or buy new, sell later check http://www.coastaltool.com good prices if stapling, set pressure and control hammer swing to avoid breaking tongues on flooring use iron head mallet w gum rubber or white rubber face beats boards tight into placew/o damage power nail makes the best one, about $35. w replaceable rubber face and metal locking band, about $14. white face won't mar floor like the black, saves cleaning time
use a pneumatic finish nailer any face nailing, keep it two inches from ends to avoid splitting installed lot of braz. cherry, tigerwood, walnut etc. nice material, very hard, get "clear" grade if available and affordable tigerwood is very straight, extremely low waste factor watch the splinters on all of them, deadly