Cutting bottom of baseboards

[Mike OMelia]

Ok, what I ended up doing worked pretty good. But I was just wondering if there was a dedicated or better tool for this. I wanted to tuck wood flooring under it (not all the way to the wall). I used my Dewalt biscuit cutter. With a a base of thin plywood double sided taped to machine base for correct height. I guess there are other ways to deal with door moulding. But that was my idea.

[George Bokros]

Why not remove the baseboard and rip on the table saw? That is what I do then reinstall the baseboard after the wood flooring is installed. You can also just remove and reinstall without ripping as long as you do not have any doorways without casing.

[Jamie Buxton]

Yeah, there are dedicated saws called jamb saws. Think of a circular saw made so that its blade almost lies flat on the floor. Here's one that came up with a google on "jamb saw" -- https://www.amazon.com/Roberts-17076-10-46-6-Inch-Jamb/dp/B00016BHO6

[Travis Porter]

Fein and the other universal style tools have a blade to do this. Bosch used to make what is called a fine cut saw that does it, and there are the jamb saws.

[Lee Schierer]

I've trimmed door jambs with my Bosch multi tool and a wood cutting bit. To trim base boards with a multi-tool would take a lot of time. I think I would remove them and reinstall them after the new floor was put down.

[Mark Bolton]

The biscuit cutter sounds like a great solution to me if you have the depth of cut for your base. Jamb saws are great but unless your a flooring contractor investing in a decent quality jamb saw wouldnt be worth it. Additionally often times the jamb saws will run fairly thin, fragile, blades. The biscuit joiner runs a bulldog of a carbide blade that would handle a lot of abuse. I'd take it as a viable option over pulling the base, drawing all the nails out the back, ripping, re-installing (which never goes back as nice as it came out if it was nice to begin with). Your only trouble spot is inside corners but with the small shoe of the biscuit joiner a multi tool and scrap of flooring would take care of those.

Nice idea.

[Mike OMelia]

I really try hard to not repurpose tools because there are always safety issues. But in this case, I could see none. I did not want to rip up baseboards. And the real issue is the door moulding and jambs. I did have to use a die grinder to “finish”, but it was all worth it. A better solution might have involved a wood cutting blade for the die grinder. But I could not find one. If this helps someone else , great.

[Mike OMelia]

I mean, the biscuit blade is hidden entire time unless you press it. So it’s not unsafe. I used my Jet sanding belt station to sand faux base to proper height.

[Mike Hollingsworth]

I always saw flooring installers use a multimaster type tool, but that biscuit cutter idea is ingenious.

[Mike OMelia]

lol, it’s not like I use it for much else, I build guitars. But I almost forgot I owned it until I was shopping around at Lowe’s and saw one. The same one. Downside is u might hit a nail.

[Tom M King]

If you end up pulling the baseboards off, or any other molding, pull the nails through the back. You can walk them out with end cutting nippers. If you don't, there will be big, blowout holes where any nails get backed out. It saves a lot of work after re-install.

[Bill Dufour]

They make special flush cut blades for standard skilsaws. Not sure how the guard, if any can be used, works. looks like a top hat.

Bill D

[Mike OMelia]

This was not about removing a lot. Maybe an 1/8” at most? Not sure a skil Saw would leave a nice straight edge

[Hoang N Nguyen]

Removing baseboards is pretty easy once you do it a few times. I've had to remove all the baseboards in 2 bedrooms of my house because my wife wanted to shiplap the walls. There's a nice cheap tool I picked up at HD to remove the caulk joint between the baseboard and wall. You can almost remove all the caulk in one long string. After that I slide a small puddy knife in between the baseboard and wall and start to wiggle it around until I find the nails. A small 12" pry-bar at the nail location to pop it right off the wall. I've removed 12' sections of baseboard without damage and pull the nails out from the back side with a pair of pliers. After a few tries, you can remove a 12' section of baseboard in about 5 minutes.

[Mike Heidrick]

Hf has a jamb saw.

[Floyd Mah]

If you prefer to drive the nails deeper first with a nail set and then separate the baseboard from the wall with a pry bar, just use a strong magnet, as found on some of the carbide scribing pens. You can locate the nail with great accuracy, mark with a pencil and then punch the nails in with the nail set. I used this technique to remove baseboards and door trim from three rooms.