hardwood floor making process and tools

[JOSEPH RESTA]

I have little experience with woodworking and I am now fixated on the idea of making hardwood floors from raw lumber. This would be my first big project. To do this I plan to purchase a 10 inches jointer/planer ( Rikon 25-010 1.5 HP), a shaper ( Grizzly G1035P 1.5 HP) and a powerfeeder (shop fox 1/4 HP) . I came up with this selection because they seem the most powerful tools available in the 110/220 Volts category. I do not have 220 volts yet.
My goal is to produce 3/4 inch thick floor from 6, 8 and some 10 inches wide raw planks (red oak?)
From a minimum of 700 to a max of 3000 sq ft as far amount coverage.


please review this process:
- miter saw to trim the 2 short ends of the boards
- jointer to finish one small and one large side of the wood.
- table saw to cut the other side of the board and dimension it
- jointer to finish the side just cut by the table saw
- table saw to create 3-4 grooves on the underside of the wood
- shaper with a tongue and groove bit along the 2 long sides of the boad.
- planer for a partial finish of the top side of the board that after the floor installation is done will be properly sanded.


I understand that this will take time. I am estimating about 30 hours for 1000 sq ft averaging 250 boards of 7 ft in length. Preparing tongue and grove to be done with the powerfeeder slowest speed possible (6ft/min) for accuracy. I am worried about the blades and bits getting dull in the process.
More powerful jointer and shaper would make it faster but I am not sure it make sense for me as first timer (machine cost, 220v modification at home and possible interest in woodworking fading)
Apart the reward of doing this myself there is also an economical incentive as I expect otherwise at least $15000 in cost for the purchase of floor (3000 sq ft)
I would appreciate your comments on the selection of the tools I listed and the feasibility of the project of doing floors in a DIY setting.
thank you

[Steve Rozmiarek]

Welcome to the creek Joseph.

You certainly aren't afraid of a pile of lumber, that sounds like a lot of work. I'll let the pros opine about your technique, but I'm going to play devils advocate about the financials. If you are going red oak, you can buy and install and finish it for less than $5/sqft, if you are a bit opportunistic. Of course, that won't get you the random widths. Tools cost too, so does time, so the cost of making it yourself is rather a false economy.

Now, if you just want to for the sake of doing it yourself, have fun, but you probably won't save any money.

[Keith Weber]

Wow! That's a LOT of work for a first-timer. I agree with Steve that you're probably not going to be saving any money, but if you're going to enjoy the journey, then that's what it's all about. I'll be incredibly impressed, however, if you can produce 1000 sq. ft. of flooring in 30 hours. If you do go ahead with it, please keep track. I'm curious as to how much time it would take you.

As far as your technique, I'd offer a couple of suggestions...

When using the jointer, technically, you should joint a flat side of the board first, and then use this side against the fence to do an edge. This will give you a 90-degree corner. If you do it the other way, it may not give you 90-degrees depending on how twisted your board was when starting. You may have already been thinking this, but you mentioned the small side (edge) in your sentence first, so I'm not sure if you were implying that the edge would come first.

Planer goes after the jointing of two sides. This will give you a consistent thickness and ensures a face parallel to the the jointed face. You need to do this BEFORE taking the board to the shaper. You'll need a consistent thickness to make the T&G alignment work properly.

You didn't mention the quality of your table saw, but assuming that it is decent enough to cut a straight edge on the board, I would not joint that edge to remove saw marks. You're going to be feeding that edge through the shaper anyway, and it will be hidden inside the joint. If your jointer set up and technique are not perfect, you could taper the board giving you an inconsistent width. This would give you issues upon installation. If your tablesaw is cheap table top version that makes it hard to give you a straight edge, an alternative way would be to set up your shaper with an outboard fence clamped to the front of the shaper and use a straight bit to "joint" to a constant width. If you were to do this, you need to use a powerfeed (do not do by hand), and you need to hold the work against the fence (ie. with featherboards).

Finally, just a curiosity question. You mentioned that you would cut three grooves in the back of each board with the tablesaw. Are you planning on using a moulding blade in your saw for this, or are you using a cove-cutting technique with an angled fence, or are you just cutting straight (not curved) kerfs?

[Mark Bolton]

Search the archives. This topic has been beaten to death here and covered extensively with many many posts identical to this.

[Peter Quinn]

From rough lumber......fools errand with home shop equipment. 1000sf finished in 30'hours? I have much better equipment than you describe and couldn't do it in twice that....and I used to do it for a living. Not a discouragement, but until you have put wood to machine and then tried to nail down this end product time estimates are hard to deduce. My first though.....you need a 10,000 pack of trash bags to hold the chips. Waste removal will quickly become a major part of the task. Straightening boards on a jointer is not a great plan. Either make a sled on the table saw or use a hand skill saw or track saw to establish the first edge. Honestly you should get your material straight lined and hit and miss planed, this will make the material more expensive but it's the best value in the whole operation. And you need to make the second shaper pass with a back fence to establish final width, avoid taper and keep widths perfectly consistent. Learn what a back fence is. That shaper is barely adequate, it will be a struggle.

[David Nelson1]

Listen to what Peter has to say. I was given the same advise, but decided to continue with my project anyway. # 1 reason was because I couldn't buy what I wanted 2nd was a reason to buy the equipment, and last but not least I had the extra time to drag it out.

I didn't see anyone mention waste count on close to 50%. I used reclaimed warped and crooked red and white oak so if your a bit more picky your mileage may differ. BTW I'm still not done I have the living, dining, and kitchen to contend with still.

My post is here (http://www.sawmillcreek.org/showthread.php?141255-T-G-flooring)

[Kevin Mazzocco]

Flooring can be a breeze to install or a total nightmarish fight. It's got to be mostly straight, milled perfectly and very consistent as to width, thickness, t&g alignment, etc. etc. Personally, I'd go to LL and pay good money for a good product and be done with it. I once bought a discounted stack of oak flooring from my local Habitat for Humanity, only to fight with it and I still have about 50% of it laying around. Since then I've bought flooring from two different reputable sources and the install and finished products have been close to perfect without the fight. Nothing is free in life, not even lunch, and certainly not flooring. I'd leave the milling to the mills and get on with more interesting projects. That's my $0.02

[Bradley Gray]

Make that $.04 for buying flooring or buy 3 or 4 of each of the machines you mentioned. Might want to see what the divorce is gonna cost also...

[Rod Sheridan]

Strangely enough, I'm in the middle of making hardwood flooring for my living and dining rooms, something I advised people against on this very forum.

So why did I change my mind? Well, as some may remember I made a sawmill to handle some ash logs from the townhouse complex, and the wood is now becoming flooring.

As I knew it would be, it's a stack of work.

I have 70% of it planed now, next is straight line rip and rip to width, then off to the shaper.

I used the stock feeder on the jointer, saved a ton of work, now the stock feeder will be used again for sawing and of course on the shaper.

I noticed that you want to run at 6 feet per minute??????? That will really dull your cutters, you should be 3 to 4 times that fast........Rod.

[JOSEPH RESTA]

Thank you Keith,
after reading your comments I have learned that:
- it is better to flat with the jointer the larger side of the board first (I would have done the smaller first)
- I had in mind to use the planer before the shaper but only on one sire (the bottom part), is it worth to use the planer also on the part that will be later sanded after the installation?
- I will eliminate the step where I use the jointer after the table saw cuts. My table saw is a cheap light one. I will put some heavier object and be careful with the thickness consistency. (12 inches digital caliber).
- Yes I will have a 1/4 powerfeeder used for table/shaper and most probably also the jointer (not sure i can do the small edge with a powerfeeder)
- as far as the grooves in the back I was thinking of just cutting straight kerfs. I can incline the blade if this is better

thank again for taking the time to give me these advices.
Joe

[JOSEPH RESTA]

Thank Peter,
- apart from the flooring project here discussed you basically are recommending as a general technique to straight both the short edges of the board with the table saw. I see.. I should use the shaper only for the bottom part of the board.. And will be faster too probably. I would like to avoid the refinement step of again running the boards with the shaper also considering that these edges will run through the shaper.
- I admit I did not consider the sawdust management issue
- as far as the shaper I was thinking of using slow speed 6ft/min to compensate the relative low power 1.5 HP

[Erik Loza]

Joseph, I sell industrial machinery for a living and agree with many folks here: It would be much, MUCH easier to just buy the flooring. My feeling is that it will cost you several-fold the time and money to do what you are talking about if you choose to go the DIY route. For example, I think you would quickly discover why most machines folks use to do profiling with on a production scale are 220V. It's your wallet and time and I respect that. Best of luck, whatever you decide to do.

Erik Loza
Minimax USA

[Jim German]

A good 1.5HP shaper should have no problem handling a much faster feed rate for a simple T&G.

Keep in mind that this is going to be very boring woodworking. You're just going to be running board after board through a shaper/jointer/planer/saw.

Lastly, that jointer/planer that you linked has a pretty small table to be jointing 7' boards. Depending on how rough the lumber you get is, you'll also be making a bunch of passes for each board. The rough lumber I get is almost 1-1/8" thick, and I usually only take a 1/32" off per pass on my 120V planer.

[Keith Weber]

Joe, the main purpose of the planer is to bring the board to a uniform thickness after jointing. The jointer will make a flat face, and this face MUST be placed face-down when fed into the planer. Both sides of your board will be machined. The first face will be machined by your jointer, the opposite face will be machined by your planer. If you only plane the face that you just did with the jointer, you will defeat the purpose of using the jointer, and you will end up with a board that will more than likely be twisted.

I would seriously take into consideration the concerns of others about buying ready-made flooring. I think that you're severely underestimating the amount of work that it will take to make 3000 sq. ft. of hardwood flooring from scratch. Personally, that's a project that I wouldn't want to tackle, and I'm equipped with a jointer, planer, saw, shaper, and widebelt sander, each with 7.5hp or more. For me, it's more of a time/workload thing, rather than an equipment thing. I'd just rather build things that are more fun to build. With a 115V machinery, I wouldn't even remotely consider a project like this. Not that it couldn't be done, but my guess is that you'd have to have the drive of an Olympic athlete to complete such a project without giving up before you finish.

[peter gagliardi]

A 1/4 hp feeder will not be able to handle the heft of those boards- look for a 1 hp. If your tablesaw is a portable- universal motor vs induction, with belt drive, you will burn it up long before you finish. In short, you don't have enough equipment to do this job. Not trying to discourage, but as the old saying goes, " never bring a knife to a gunfight!" Really applies here! You will have a large investment in lumber here, and if you can't get to a finished product, it will be wasted. I make flooring for a living, I have the proper equipment, and i still have a hard time competing against the big mills!

[Andrew Joiner]

Lastly, that jointer/planer that you linked has a pretty small table to be jointing 7' boards. Depending on how rough the lumber you get is, you'll also be making a bunch of passes for each board. .

Yes, That was my first thought. How strong are you? This will be a lot of hard work, but you can feel what it's like by this test. Set a 37" long chunk of scrap at the same height as that jointer. This represents that jointer's 37"length. Now take a 7' oak board. Lift it to up and rest 18"of the oak boards face flat on half of the simulated jointer tables. Now push down on that 18" while you support the remaining 66'' that hangs off the table. The 7' of oak is only fully supported by the jointer tables for about 1/3 of it's pass over them. That's why big jointers with long tables are best for this. A planer sled would be less effort.
It might be cheaper and a lot less work to order your oak S4S (surfaced on both faces and both edges).

This flooring can be made with minimal machinery, but it will be slow going. Only you can say if it's worth it. Heck, there's guys here in the neander forum who prepare rough stock with hand tools only!

[Brian Holcombe]

I think that the pricing will be in his favor when it comes to big plank, that's hard to find in good supply and also somewhat expensive. I think it's lost on red oak, personally, would do white oak or white ash. Soap finish.

I think I would split the difference here, I would consider buying what you can in regard to the lumber, but would get a quote for the machine work and finishing from a local mill. I would ask for best pricing on the wood from whoever you're buying it from, if this is a whole-house sized project they can probably work with you on it.

[JOSEPH RESTA]

I agree that if I decide to do so much floor I should consider a more expensive grade to maximize the effort. For now I selected red oak because it is readily available, I have not searched for alternatives and I will do that.
Keeping the discussion on red oak, the most expensive board would be a 1x10x8 for $8.33 a piece, the cheapest 1x6x8 sold for $3.20. This means 1000 Sq ft material would cost about $1000 ($800 if I had to choose only 1x6x8 and $1250 if I use only 1x10x8).
It is not a lot of money for all that floor and such large pieces, unless my math is wrong.
At least I have not found yet places selling such large boards already finished at good prices. If I do not get crazy in the process and I can complete 3000 sq ft for $3000 in material don’t you think is something to consider? We are talking about easily a $10.000 saving, cost of a new machines for the shop and change. I also selected large boards because in a way imperfections such as gap between the boards is seen more typical also on god installations while a mediocre work on 2 ½ boards would really show.

thank you

[Erik Loza]

Joseph, please do not take this the wrong way: Your math, above, is fine and dandy but it all is contingent on the assumption that nothing goes wrong with the machinery during your project and also, I don't see where the cost of tooling is factored in there for the shaper, jointer, planer, etc. In other words, you would be 100% correct if the this whole project existed only on paper. Also, your logic operates on one other big assumption: That your time is worth nothing. In other words, the fact that you have it boiling down to "$3,000' sq. for $3K" assumes that you are a 100% skilled tradesman, with absolutely nothing else you could or might be doing that would be of value, time-wise. Again, I am not saying this to pick your logic apart, just speaking from personal experience. I can give you two real-world examples, from both ends of the picture.

First, I have a customer who who purchased a short-stroke (less than 8') sliding table saw from me a while back. A pro guy, doing lots of casework. He explained to me that he had figured out work-arounds for not being able to rip a full 4x8 panel through the blade, it was going to save him money, it was all thought out, etc. Well, he called me less than a year later, regretting that he had not purchased a machine which could indeed do full 4x8 sheets because he ran into many "unforseen" complications in workflow. Point being that things rarely work out in an "ideal way" when we are trying out new projects for the first time. He bought a second machine from me at that point, so ended up losing money on the plan.

Second, my own experience. I rebuilt the front end on my wife's 4Runner a couple of years ago. I enjoy wrenching and am good at it, so my logic was like yours: "Do it myself and save some money". Well, I got the 4Runner back together, dropped it off at the shop for an alignment and the manager calls me. "There's a problem..." Turns out that one of the brand-new wheel bearings I paid the local machine shop top press in, they more than likely tweaked it during the pressing and ruined it. It wasn't my fault but it was absolutely my problem. So, I had the choice to either rip the whole front end apart again, myself, then argue with the machine shop about who was actually to blame, all the while being tied up with another 8-hour project under the vehicle in the middle of a hot summer. Or, I could just pay the shop to pull it all apart and put in a fresh bearing of their own, which is what I ended up doing. So, I spent $1,000 by trying to save $1,000, all through no fault of my own and still was out several days of my time in the process.

Anyway, what I am trying to say is that everything would be perfect if each of our projects existed only in a vacuum. I hope this makes sense.

Erik Loza
Minimax USA

[Peter Quinn]

Just to make sure we are on the same page as I try to talk you back towards the light.......

First post you said raw boards, by which I understood rough lumber, which typically comes random widths....lots of waste, lots of bow, lots of defects, potential for 30%-40% waste but lower price per BF. Now you are citing prices for 1X6 and 1X10 material, which is dimensioned lumber. Different product entirely. You will never get 6" floor boards from 1X6, and you will never get 8' yield form 8' lumber, or almost never. Are you buying dimensioned lumber at a home center? If so the prices you have listed are more than likely per lineal foot prices. If not please post location so others may go and rob the fool selling at those prices. Typically whole sale price on FAS (i.e. top quality clear) red oak is in the $1.25-$1.50 per BF range, and thats kiln dried, random widths, possibly sorted for length somewhat, rough. You may find small local operations that have low over head come in lower, but even your most bumped on the head high on chain saw fumes red kneck sawyer these days has a smart phone and can track the average wholesale BF price in their area, and few like to sell much cheaper than market. You listed $3.20 for a 1X6X8, which is less than $1/BF for dimensioned material.....that is a steal, sounds too good to be true....so what is that source and are you sure of that price?

Moving along, if you get a 1X6, it has a 5.5" face, you need to remove at least 1/16" from each edge during shaping plus you have a 1/4" tongue.....so if all works well you will get a 5" face from a 1X6. And if all goes well you may get 7' from an 8' board once checks and snipe are removed during defecting/cross cutting. Keep your face yield in mind when pricing and sourcing lumber.

Around here I'm seeing around $2/BF for hit and missed red oak, rough edges, random widths, to the trade. A bit better on quantity at what is essentially a whole sale level. Lets call your waste 25% to be generous form rough to finished widths and lengths. So you need 3800BF to do 3000 SF, at $2/BF, I see your materials cost around $6000. You might do better if you can buy true whole sale, but most outfits that sell by the mil board foot (thats lumber speak for selling in thousand BF quantities) want you to have a fork lift at off load, plus you pay freight, typical $500-$800 depending on your location. If you buy from a typical home center count on a price closer to $6/BF when all is said and done.


So while I can't say for sure your math is off....it sure smells funny. We are both in New England, lumber markets are similar, should I be driving to RI to buy lumber?

[Mark Bolton]

I agree that if I decide to do so much floor I should consider a more expensive grade to maximize the effort. For now I selected red oak because it is readily available, I have not searched for alternatives and I will do that.
Keeping the discussion on red oak, the most expensive board would be a 1x10x8 for $8.33 a piece, the cheapest 1x6x8 sold for $3.20. This means 1000 Sq ft material would cost about $1000 ($800 if I had to choose only 1x6x8 and $1250 if I use only 1x10x8).
It is not a lot of money for all that floor and such large pieces, unless my math is wrong.
At least I have not found yet places selling such large boards already finished at good prices. If I do not get crazy in the process and I can complete 3000 sq ft for $3000 in material don’t you think is something to consider? We are talking about easily a $10.000 saving, cost of a new machines for the shop and change. I also selected large boards because in a way imperfections such as gap between the boards is seen more typical also on god installations while a mediocre work on 2 ½ boards would really show.

thank you

Peter is being very generous with his numbers above. While of course you can clarify your numbers, I think your numbers are WAY WAY low.

Our numbers for kiln dried red oak are in the vicinity of what Peter posted however I would be shocked to see the yield he mentioned. I would guess the post stating 50% loss may be a bit steep but 25% seems very optimistic to me.

There is no doubt about it, going about this in the way your mentioning and with the equipment youve outline, your going to lose your shirt and likely wind up with a bunch of firewood or a very "creative" floor that cost you dearly.

As Erik has stated.. What about tooling? Sharpening? and so on? For this quantity it wouldnt be unreasonable to have $1000 in tooling alone for your shaper.

Do yourself a favor, dont lie to yourslef, sit down with a pencil and paper, and figure out every single cost, and apply a waste factor of 40% to be safe. So if you are going to mill 1000 square feet of material you will need 1400' (I bet you still will be short). This can all be done with a pen and paper before you make the mistake.

[M Toupin]

edit - well, it looks like about 4 of us were all composing the same basic response at the same time

At first thought I was going to delete this, but I figure I'll leave it up just in case :D

Not trying to discourage you so much as to warn you what you're in for. As others have said, you're not going to save much if anything on this endeavor. There's no way you're going to get 3000sf of finished product out of $3000 worth of wood even if you start with the 1X6X8 material. Unless you're getting hand selected, 100% defect free material you'll need to plan on 25% or more waste, probably more than that and that's before installation which will take another 10%-15% if you're really careful. And that’s just the materials piece of the pie.

Next problem you're going to run into is you're machines; the ones you have listed are hobby level machines at best. You really can't expect them to do commercial duty and survive to the end. Seriously, you'll need at least some light duty industrial stuff if you even consider this. The 40" tables (20" on each side) on the jointer/planer are too short to reasonably flatten 8' boards same goes for edging. Not to mention you'll need a feeder (1hp) to feed that much rough lumber through it. Doing that much by hand would just plain be extreme punishment.

You'll probably need to send the majority of those 8' boards over the jointer twice so you're up to 1500lf over the jointer to flatten. Add in a couple more passes to edge and you're up to about 3,000lf. Next you're on to planning; same drill, 3-5 trips through to get down to you're 3/4" target, maybe more. Oh, and by the way, as mentioned before, you're going to be up to you're armpits in chips at this point. Waste management is going to be a big concern about now.

Another thought; what's you're tooling plan? Just jointing and planning you're up to about 6,800lf over those knives. That poor little hobby duty jointer/planner was never designed for that kind of abuse and the knives sure won't come even close to making it. Honestly I'd be surprised if you even get 1000sf out of a set of knifes so figure the price of new knives X somewhere about 6 changes or so.

And that’s all before you can even think about straight lining. Same deal, you’ll want a feeder for the TS for this too, hand feeding that much isn’t really an option but you could I guess if you’re up for the workout.

Next up profiling. The back relief is more than just a couple of saw kerfs. For 6” wide material you’ll need bare minimum 3” molding head running profile knifes if you send you’re pieces though twice. Once through and flip it end for end and back through again to hit the other side. A 3” molding head will need at least a 1” spindle, 1 1/4” would be much better. The 1.5hp griz is only ½- ¾“ and I won’t even mention that little 1/4hp feeder being way under powered. That’s 2 trips though and another for sizing and T&G and you’re up to about 3,000lf there also. And that’s before you square then ends and match if you’re going that route, before you can even think about laying the first board. Oh, and same deal with shaper cutters as with the jointer/planner knifes... a set aint going to get you through without some sharpening

If you’re still game and still thinking about moving forward, I’d give you one last thought. Do yourself a huge favor and stick with a single width and I’d highly recommend 6” or whatever max you can get out of you’re materials after straight lining it. You got a ton of work with just one setup. Changing setups over and over is going to be a major pita.

Mike

[Peter Quinn]

My numbers above were very generous.....waste is more likely higher than 25% for sure, even on 1X material, where if a board you pick doesn't work out it may not make anything. Add to your equation the cost of the logosol you purchase when all your original equipment bites the dust half way through the huge pile of wood........



http://www.logosol.us/planers/sh410/

[David Nelson1]

I made the comment about the 50% waste and in my case I was trying to mill boards with out cutting some of the defects out like nasty knots. It all looked good during the skip planing portion but after letting it sticker for a while I saw a whole different picture LOL

As far as tooling, the tongue and groove profile I was using it was good for about 1200 linear feet. I went thru 3 sets. I was getting from a place in Long Island for around 200.00 if I recall correctly.

Hats off to ya if you decide to plow thru.

[Tom M King]

I build stuff for a living- 41 years now. I have accumulated at least a couple hundred k of tools and equipment. When I need flooring, I buy it almost always, unless the call is for something that can't normally be bought.

An old builder told me, a long time ago, "You can build something real fast in your head.". It's always a game of looking for a better way. Let us know how it works out for you. You may enjoy the process.

[Eric Shapin]

So, how long will you store this wood in your shop before you work on it? Do you have a place for 3000 sq. feet of wood, or will you purchase/mill/install as you go? Remember, as you joint/plane/rip your rough cut into floor boards, the insides are now newly exposed to the atmosphere, and are likely to warp, at least some. This can be managed in certain ways on smaller projects and, to a certain extent, a warped board can be forced into place with your flooring nailer. But, you may want to heed the phrase "to a certain extent"; warpage of many boards could render your investment to be worth little more than a 3000 sq. foot x 3/4" thick pile of firewood.

From all of the above comments, looks like there are many potential failure modes to be navigated; no doubt, many others abound that have not yet been identified on this forum. Good luck. If you succeed, please post pics. Regardless, again, best of luck. You will need it.

[Richard Wolf]

I'm a man of few words, so I will say it in four words; IT'S A STUPID IDEA.

[JOSEPH RESTA]

Peter and all,
this weekend I will step for the first time in a wood mill and understand a bit more of what I am facing here. The prices I mentioned were derived by these numbers posted on the local mill website. I assume they are for rough wood to be surfaced on all sides. If I did not get confused with the concept of BF and Sq Ft conversion, the number for "theoretical" rough wood needed are correct. i.e $1250 for 1000 Sq Ft with a 1x10x8.
I did not anticipate such large scrap amount to be honest, thinking that oak does not have as much knots or defects as in pine and I though that areas I cut with the miter saw could be in part reused as short ones. I thank the experts in the forum pointed this out 30-50% is really a lot.

OAK PRICE SHEET PRICE PER BOARD FOOT
--------8----10---12---14---16
1 X 4 0.80 0.80 0.80 0.90 1.00
1 X 6 0.80 0.80 0.80 0.90 1.00
1 X 8 0.90 0.90 0.90 1.00 1.10
1 X 10 1.25 1.25 1.25 1.35 1.45
1 X 12 1.25 1.25 1.25 1.35 1.45

[Keith Weber]

Joe,

Googling your prices, I see that you're getting your quotes from James Thompson Native Hardwoods. That seems awfully cheap. After looking at their website, I'll throw in a guess as to why. I didn't see anywhere on their website that mentioned that the rough lumber you are referring to is dried. I gather that you're fairly new to woodworking judging by things you said in your posts, so you may not have picked up on that, or thought to ask. You can verify it with them as to whether or not it is dried, but know that you cannot make hardwood flooring for a house out of non-dried lumber. It needs to be either kiln-dried which will jack up your prices more in line with what others were saying, or it needs to be air-dried. I've never done the air-drying thing myself, so I'll let others with more expertise in this field chime in, but I'm guessing that you'd have to find a place to sticker, store, and end-seal your 4000+ board feet of lumber for a year or more before you can begin working with it.

There's usually a reason that things are cheap.

Have you given any thought to finishing? Judging by your posts, it kinda sounded like you might be planning on sanding/finishing after the the floor was put in, versus pre-finishing. They both have their pros and cons, but either way, you're going to make a lot of dust, require a lot of space, and you have to ask yourself how your finishing skills are. It'd be a tough job to match the surface finish of factory-finished lumber if you don't have a lot of experience in this area. I've seen people build beautiful furniture only to destroy it the minute they take a brush, pad, roller or a spray gun to it.

[Rod Sheridan]

I'm a man of few words, so I will say it in four words; IT'S A STUPID IDEA.

LOL..........I agree, I'm in the middle of making 300SF of flooring and it's a lot of work...........Regards, Rod.

[Jeff Duncan]

I think the others have covered it pretty well, I'll just add another vote from another guy with a well equipped shop that it's not going to go as you expect it to. The biggest problem I think you'll have is that "you don't know what you don't know". Or in other words, until you've actually handled jobs milling at least several hundred board feet of lumber at a time, you really don't have a grasp on what it entails.

I would say if you want to buy the equipment for other uses anyway, and are really gung-ho on it, then start small. Pick the smallest room possible, maybe a couple hundred sq. ft.. Run that room through beginning to end and you'll start to get a handle on what's involved. Anything can be done if a person has enough drive to do it, but that doesn't necessarily mean it's worth doing.

good luck,
JeffD

[Michael W. Clark]

I'll add something from a hobbyiest perspective. I think the pros and others have given you good information to spur you into looking at the economics a little differently.

I may be in the minority here, but Hobby woodworking, for me anyway, is not about saving money, because it rarely does. It is more about the ability to add customization, quality, and the enjoyment of the journy and end results. Having said that, I would encourage you to make this flooring job your own. It sounds like you are on that path to an extent with the wider boards. If you decide to do this, get creative, make it tasteful and add some customization. Use equipment that will be safe and up to the task, especially since you are new to this. In the grand scheme of the project, it will not take that much more effort (obviously dependign on how creative you get). If I were to put this much effort into something, I would want visitors to know its custom.

Good Luck,
Mike

[Peter Quinn]

First piece of equipment you need is a good moisture meter, generally when making flooring but definetly if buying from a local mill. I'd inquire if the material is kiln dried, if not is it air dried and to what %. If they give you that "whose asking" routine, like what's it to you it doesn't matter......bad place to source flooring material. As noted above the onus is on you to make sure the material is properly seasoned for your purpose....which for flooring to occupy conditioned living space means around 8% moisture content. Once you see the material you will have a better sense of the waste factor. If it's 50% I'd consider getting quotes from a different yard that can supply kD material at least hit and miss planed and one straight edge, or better yet gang ripped to your required widths, or if your purchasing randoms ripped wide as possible.

[JOSEPH RESTA]

Keith,
as you anticipated the price for the raw wood I had was unfortunatly for material not yet dried. an additional $0.40 -$0.60 for BL need to be added for the kiln.

[Michael Mayo]

So instead of $3000 for materials you are looking at $5400~ to purchase just the wood. I am all for doing everything myself but this would even give me the chills. I hope you re-think this and make some adjustments to your idea but if you do decide to go for broke I wish you all the luck in your project and definitely post pics.

[mreza Salav]

Some people know me here that I make things many won't and have better machinery than what you have and I guess more experience but there is no way in the hot place I'd even consider making flooring. I've done enough work to know that there is no way I can save money or build a better product or do it faster than what is readily available. There are soooooooo many factors you are not accounting for. If you have not dimensioned a large pack of wood you won't believe how much just emptying the dust bin is going to slow you down.
Others have said it better than me here but I am on the camp that building flooring just doesn't make sense (unless the wood is special and rare or has some special value to you personally).

[Peter Quinn]

Here's an example. My uncle bought my grandmothers house when she passed, a beautiful old Victorian split into 3 apartments years ago. He had a vision to restore it to original. There was a monster beech tree eating the front yard, killing the driveway, had to go. So he had it felled, saved the trunks, made into lumber, searched for a flooring company to make the flooring. What better than to turn that tre that had shaded us so many hot summers into a fine floor to last another century! Very romantic. He got a price lets say of $6.75/SF to turn his green wood into flooring. Being a cheep scate of the first order, he found that a little high, the house was over 3000 SF...after all he had been to lumber liquidators and new what flooring cost! Tongue deep in cheek......So he asked for a price if he did not supply the wood........$7/SF. Even if the wood is FREE most of the value in a floor unless it is some rare and precious species is not the lumber, it's the labor, particularly if the wood is green and rough which makes it worth considerably less as a commodity. So as you are saving 15K on flooring, ask your self do you like making flooring? What else could you be doing to make money during that massive block of time spent handling boards that could make money to pay for flooring? I'm a cabinet maker, I'd rather work every weekend this year to pay for a new floor than spend half of them making it!

[JOSEPH RESTA]

After the research done and the valuable comments received by the forum I will say that my idea of making hardwood floor on such large scale is probably indefinitely at hold.
my next step has been calling the electrician to have a quote for a 220v in my garage. this would give me more options for machines and access the much larger pool of used ones.
thanks again

[Erik Loza]

...my next step has been calling the electrician to have a quote for a 220v in my garage...

That is a great choice, regardless of whether or not you decide to pursue the flooring project. Best of luck with it.

Erik Loza
Minimax USA

[David Nelson1]

That is a great choice, regardless of whether or not you decide to pursue the flooring project. Best of luck with it.

Erik Loza
Minimax USA

I totally agree with Mike I bought equipment twice because I didn't understand the requirements. Actually I didn't ask the forum till after the fact so you are ahead of the game.

[Kent A Bathurst]

Late to the party.

Joeseph - you have ended up in the right place.

Just to keep things in perspective -

The producers of flooring invest an amount of $$ in equipment that is nearly beyond belief. They do this because that is the only way to be profitable - you have to run giant volumes to keep the cost per LF in line.

For example - the molder takes rough material - already ripped to width - and does the work of a jointer, planer, and shaper in our world. But, in that world, it is 35' - 40' long, new approaches $500k for the molder only, and runs the flooring at 700 - 1,000 lineal feet per minute. There are versions that run much, much faster than thaat.

Think about that last number. Every second, you have 2 8' pieces of flooring. Then think about the material handling systems you need to be sure you run butt-to-butt through the molder. If you don't, you are wasting production capacity.

Then - you have to gang rip before the molder in feed. You have to defect cut after the molder outfeed. You have to stack and sort.


My point here is this: Like the old adage "Never get in an argument with people that purchase ink by the barrel", "Never think you can beat the industry on a commodity item that is produced at multiple pieces per second."

Give them their investment, and their profit margins, and be thankful they are there.

[Peter Quinn]

Late to the party.

Joeseph - you have ended up in the right place.

Just to keep things in perspective -

The producers of flooring invest an amount of $$ in equipment that is nearly beyond belief. They do this because that is the only way to be profitable - you have to run giant volumes to keep the cost per LF in line.

For example - the molder takes rough material - already ripped to width - and does the work of a jointer, planer, and shaper in our world. But, in that world, it is 35' - 40' long, new approaches $500k for the molder only, and runs the flooring at 700 - 1,000 lineal feet per minute. There are versions that run much, much faster than thaat.

Think about that last number. Every second, you have 2 8' pieces of flooring. Then think about the material handling systems you need to be sure you run butt-to-butt through the molder. If you don't, you are wasting production capacity.

Then - you have to gang rip before the molder in feed. You have to defect cut after the molder outfeed. You have to stack and sort.


My point here is this: Like the old adage "Never get in an argument with people that purchase ink by the barrel", "Never think you can beat the industry on a commodity item that is produced at multiple pieces per second."

Give them their investment, and their profit margins, and be thankful they are there.

Agreed, except for the 1000' per minute. That's a little fast I think, 50-100 LF per minute is more likely until you are into a massive machine which runs around 250k. Even a four knife molding head spinning at 20K rpm can only take so many cuts per inch. Last molder my former boss bought ran just under 100lf per minute, took 75 lineal feet of shop space, cost around $250k. You can easily run flooring on a much smaller machine, say a little weinig profimat or scmi, maybe $95k new, takes up 15 LF plus your in and out feed space, maybe 40 feet, plus an up cut defect line....plus a place to make pack of flooring until it's ready to move, plus 3500+ cfm's of chip collection......maybe an end matcher for wide plank, gets
Rich quick.

Joseph, good call on the not making flooring. Or at least furthering the investigation before proceeding. If you change your mind do so well informed!

[Kent A Bathurst]

Peter - No argument with you. Simply adding more info to the discussion -

There are machines designed specifically for flooring. They would not really fit any other molded product.

9 head. Maybe 11 head. The big trick is there are two pairs of side heads that are what they call "opposing". THose pairs are directly opposite each other. Not the design you would find in a "normal" molder, where there is only one pair of side heads, and they are not opposing - - you pass one, and then the other, in sequence. Flooring profiles, at those speeds, require this unique configuration.

You can run flooring on a Profimat. $95 k is pretty high for that machine, in my experinece. I run specialty flooring [not commodity indoor flooring] on a Profimat at one plant @ 30 - 50 LFPM. I run it on an H22 at another plant @ 120 LFPM.

But - those are speciatly flooring products. Plus, at that investment and feed speeds, we match our customer's demand. NO need for anything different, plus we run other products on those molders.

Trust me - the big-time Domestic flooring producers are at, or near, 1,000 LFPM. You go to Europe, you will see machinery running at twice that. No kidding - twice. Mind-boggling. The equipment and floor space to simply feed a molder at that speed is fascinating.

I've got 9 molders at 4 plants, with 2 new ones coming in the next 45 days [220 LFPM]. They are not "my" plants. I am the guy that does factory designs and layouts, productivity improvements, equipment specification and purchasing, equipment installation and training, blah, blah, blah. I am neck-deep in molder specs and performance at the moment. 2 new ones [220 LFPM] installed in the past 9 months.

The thing that always knocks the "fancy titles" off stride is someone tosses out a number for a new molder - $165 is typical for us. And then I come back with the entire project budget. The molder is usually about 40% of the total, once you deal with infeed systems, outfeed systems, cutterheads and tooling, electric, and - the biggie - dust systems.

[Mel Fulks]

Kent, There is a BIG company near you that could use some moulder expertise. Every time one orders stock mouldings the profiles don't match the last stuff.