Make my own flooring

[Phil Landwer]

I've got a closet. About 100 sq. ft.
I wanna put some red oak flooring in there, and I want to mill the wood myself. (please don't bombard me with "it ain't worth it").

I've got a nice router mounted under a small router table.
I want the boards to be 3.5" wide.
Where do I get the right router bit, and how wide a board do I start with, to end up with 3.5" width?
I do not plan on routing the ends.
I've got lots of red oak, I can rip to width. I'm fine with lengths 3' on up.

I also have a Woodmaster planer, but I'm not gonna buy all their attachments, to do flooring with it.

Do I need to mill/mold the bottom of the boards? If so, I suppose I could do that on the Woodmaster....or could I do that with the boards on edge, on the router table?

I want a flush top, no micro-bevel.

[David Kumm]

It will be more consistent if you have a power feeder. You would want to mill the boards face down and the tongue to be undersized. Using and outboard fence and trapping the board between the fence and cutter insures consistent width. A shaper would be a better choice but if the router table is heavy it should work. The feeder is really helpful though. It is hard to get consistency handfeeding oak with featherboards. If you wreck much wood it would be cheaper to go to a millwork place and have them run it. The woodmaster would be great at relieving the under side. Dave

[Phil Landwer]

I'm confused about this "consistant width".
If my tongue is to be 1/2", and I want 3.5" flooring, then first I rip a bunch of 4" boards on my table saw.
It's not hard to get consistant width of boards, thru my table saw.
What am I missing?

[Phil Landwer]

Or, would it be easier using the Magic Molder, for my table saw?

The focus here, is small scale. I'm not doing thousands of feet of flooring.
I do have a stock feeder. Seems like a stock feeder on my table saw, and a Magic Molder insert might do it... Ya? No?

http://magicmolder.com/catalog/Flooring.html

[robert raess]

Doing Floors for a living, i have thought of a T&G set, and have always talked myself out of thispurchase. Here's what i would do.There are bits on the market made for wood floors[1/4" shaft].They only produce the groove.Net cut all your wood to final dimensions. Set depth of groove and groove all 4 sides.You can make, or flooring co.'s sell hardwood spline, which fits perfectly in the groove and becomes a tongue, do that on one short side and one long side..glue the spline, and then nail with floor nailer....it works fine

[David Kumm]

Phil, I was assuming you are doing tongue and groove flooring and blind nailing. Usually the cut underneath the tongue is recessed slightly from the top so the top fits tightly. That requires a bit that cuts both at once unless you run the board, reset the fence and run it again on the other side. You could cut the groove deep and then run the boards through the planer with the tongue side down to insure exactly the same width. A planer gives a better edge than a jointer due to consistent feeding as well. Dave

[Phil Landwer]

Phil, I was assuming you are doing tongue and groove flooring and blind nailing.

Your assumption is correct.
That's exactly what I want to do.
Don't those Magic Molder inserts do this?

[Jamie Buxton]

Do you want to blind-nail your flooring? Or do you want to face-nail it? There's lots of floors in this country with face-nailed flooring. An advantage is that you can mill the flooring entirely with a jointer, planer, and tablesaw -- no edge profiling required.

If you want to do a tongue-and-groove approach, most full-line router bit companies offer sets for tongue-and-groove flooring. For instance http://www.mlcswoodworking.com/orderstatus/html/smarthtml/pages/bit_tongue_groove.html and http://www.amanatool.com/bits-fv/wood_flooring_routerbit_sets.html .

[Phil Landwer]

I'd like to blind nail it.
It seems simple to do, using the Magic Molder inserts I linked to, in post #4.
Shouldn't that do the trick?

[David Nelson1]

Phil,

I'm in the process of doing the same task. please read the following threads.

http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?141255-T-G-flooring.....

[David Nelson1]

Your assumption is correct.
That's exactly what I want to do.
Don't those Magic Molder inserts do this?

Having gone back and looked @ the links and the fact that you have a feeder for the T/S, I feel that the magic molder work good for a short run of boards. Cut your groove first and add 1/16 to straighten the edge, then cut the tongue which should be a 1/4". Doing it this way will make better use of the wood especially if there are a few defects. The tongue can hide the variances. So rip the boards to achieve your face dimension of 3.5 + 5/16 for milling, assuming of course your using a 1/4" T/G set.

You will face nail. No way around it, even if your hand set all the nails the outside rows need to be face nailed for stability. Good Luck.

Edit: Use the woodmaster for your relief cuts. They sell a slick board with guides, but I feel you will not need it. Clamp some guides to the in and out feed tables and buy the relief cutters. Take your planer blades out and insert the relief cutters.Just tell them the model number and that you plan on using the planer head instead of an aux shaft and the custom molding head.

[Alan Lightstone]

Does that Magic Molder really have any advantages over just using a router to make the moldings (or in this case tongue and groove)?

[David Nelson1]

Does that Magic Molder really have any advantages over just using a router to make the moldings (or in this case tongue and groove)?

From what I have read he has stated that he has a feeder. If the feeder is adjustable enough and the fence is sturdy enough, the steady rate of feed will produce a better edge joint for the T/G. Hand feeding on a router table may not produce the same results. For me, I'm using a shaper and a feeder due to the amount of stock I have to feed.

[Carroll Courtney]

I would get a T&G set and a molding set for the TS and use it.Make some jigs for keeping the wood against the fence and your hands are safe.Lot better than a router table----Carroll