Hardwood Floor Inlay Advice

[Paul Steiner]

I am almost ready to start cutting a hardwood floor inlay for my house. I used the attached pic as starting point, then I drew the inlay in CAD to scale it to the size for my house and everything will be proportional. To cut it I will be using a V miter sled I found on FWW.com. Before I start I have 3 things I need advice on
1. What blade to use? Currently I have a ww2 but would a crosscut blade be better?
2. How thick should my substrate and wear layer be? I was planning on using 1/4" baltic birch and 1/2" inlay pieces.
3. Any recommendation for glue up?

Thanks in advance. I will be cutting a small mock up today and I will be sure to post pics of my progress.

[Brad Shipton]

I have made these before. I used a Baltic Birch substrate, but I know of one guy that sells these and he swears by marine grade plywood. I can't recall the name of his website, but it should be not too hard to find. He goes into quite a bit of detail on the various methods he uses and in the background you can see he uses TBIII. Onto your Q's:

1. I use a quality crosscut blade. All your cuts are max. 45 deg, so that should work fine. One that I made had some 75deg angles, so that needs more of a rip blade.

2. Czar Floors (award winning inlay seller) builds them out of solid 3/4", but I am a fan of the engineered concept. I think the engineered inlays perform better. I would not exceed a 5/16" wear layer. Preferably closer to a engineered flooring wear thickness (5mm). Charles provides examples where he has made up 5/16" parquet squares and glued them direct to the subfloor, so you can even do that if it works with your surrounding areas. The total thickness of your floor around the inlay will determine the substrate thickness. I dont know what size you are aiming for with this inlay, but if this is a large inlay, you might want to think about making this a balanced glue up. A large square will bow and you may have trouble adding enough weight to get it flat during the install.

3. I use either epoxy or urea formaldehyde in my vac press, but I know Charles Peterson recommends Bostik's Best or the Sika equivalent. I have made some items like this with TBII or TBIII, and I am not impressed by the amount of bow the water causes.

Did you think about purchasing Charles Peterson's Flooring Book? It is a great resource for this and I highly recommend it. He goes into a lot of detail about cutting, adhesives, and all sorts of other details for this.

Brad

[Chris Padilla]

What hardwoods will you be using for the various colors?

[Rob Wright]

http://www.majesticmedallions.com/

This guy goes into a lot of detail on his construction means and methods if you search around his site. I know of him from a few other forums that we are both members of.

[Paul Steiner]

178028178028
I love how projects spiral into new projects. This is a pic of my mock up which I just finished cutting from utility grade oak. It is 3/4" thick and all the pieces are 2"wide.
Looks good but I can already see how gluing would be a huge problem without a vacuum press. So I have decided to make or buy a press. Lucky me I have 3 vacuum pumps that I have given or saved from the trash.
178029
Now I just need to make a buy/bag. I found this link and I will probably try this:http://www.woodmagazine.com/woodworking-tips/editorial-extras/shop-made-vacuum-press-bag/

Chris to answer your question Walnut and Maple in the middle it would be nice to have something exotic. I have a piece of wenge, I just need something to contrast that.

If you have more advice I am all ears.

[David Nelson1]

Wow your mock up came out great

[Lucas G Hager]

Could I get some details such as:
How thick is your hardwood going to be?
How thick is your ply?
Which ply are you going with?
I'm interested in doing this to my home. I've layed hardwood flooring. But never nothing like that. I have always been curious the steps that are gone through.
BTW, your mock up looks awesome.
EDIT: I followed the above link, and it answered many of my questions.

[Jamie Buxton]

....Now I just need to make a buy/bag. I found this link and I will probably try this:http://www.woodmagazine.com/woodworking-tips/editorial-extras/shop-made-vacuum-press-bag/
...
If you have more advice I am all ears.

My bags are transparent. I think that would be a lot better than the opaque stuff that link uses. I can see whether the layup has shifted while I've been loading it into the bag, and I can see what's going on while the pump sucks down. I use 20 mil vinyl that I get from a local plastics supplier, but I've seen the same stuff in a fabric place. It is maybe $5 a running yard in the 54" width. The same supplier offers vinyl cement to glue it together. Vinyl hose can come from the same supplier, or from Home Depot, where is it less expensive.

[Paul Steiner]

Jamie you are exactly correct. I was thinking about how I was going to lay the pieces in the bag prior to starting the vacuum and then keep them in place. Possibly a clear shower curtain for the top layer of the bag and shower lining for the bottom. I found this on ebay: http://cgi.ebay.com/New-2-yards-Clear-Vinyl-Plastic-20-Mil-Sheet-54-W-PVC-/190478376933?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2c59655fe5
is this similiar to what you use?

[Chris Padilla]

http://www.veneersupplies.com/

All kinds of bags there and special tape you can use along with good glues. I've used a lot of supplies here and they all work well.

If you go the veneer route on a substrate, your choices of wood go up exponentially.

[Paul Steiner]

199923
I finally finished and installed the my inlay. The squares are maple and walnut, the triangles in the middle are cherry and wenge. The pieces are half inch mounted on 1/4" baltic birch. I used 2 part epoxy and used a vacuum veneer bag to hold everything while the expoxy cured. This design allowed me to miter the inlay in instead of having to make a template and the fit came together really well.
I made 5 inlays total. Once I got the jigs dialed in and process down I kept making them I chose the best one for my home but I still have 4 good ones. I will probably be selling the 4 I have or give them to friends.
Of all my woodworking projects this is the most prominent and probably what I am most proud of.

[Jamie Buxton]

Wow! Nice job. Getting the center points at the middle of the star to meet is a challenge.

[Dave Gaul]

Good Gosh that is awesome! I have to quit looking at it, the more I look, the more 3D the image becomes, messes with my eyes!!!

Great job man, hope you post the finished floor too...

[David Nelson1]

Very nice indeed Paul. Wifey wants something for our HW floor thats simular. I told give me a couple of years LOL

[Paul Steiner]

Aligning the center points was a challenge. I actually practiced assembling it prior to gluing.