Old hardwood floors and dealing with the nail holes.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Hello,
I viewed the pics of the deck work on the EZ Smart website and it got me thinking.
I'm going to be redoing some hardwood floors that have tack-less strips nailed down.
Would it be possible to route say a 3/4" to 1" slot where the nail holes are and place a strip of a contrasting color wood in that slot?

My idea would be to route and place the strip prior to sanding the floor, leaving the strips slightly proud. that way when the floor is sanded, everything will be even.

(Please -please - please say yes! I want an excuse to buy the EZ Smart and this would be a perfect one ;))

Or am I better off just going the more pedestrian route of filling the nail holes?
Or is there some alternate method that would be better?

(Even though it's a rental unit, I'd love to have it dressed up to provide some visual appeal.)

[Pete Brown]

If you're stripping the whole floor anyway, the only potential problem I see is that you may hit a nail or two and go through a couple router bits.

You can also use a circular saw to do the work, but you'll want to take steps to make sure there is no chip-out.

Don't glue the contrasting wood in place if you are cross-grain with the current flooring. You need to allow for wood movement.

Pete

[Tim Devery]

Rich, I am a floor pro and have never seen such as thing. Not saying it cannot be done, but will require a lot of work VS 10 minutes of filling holes.
Also visualize how the strip will look along with the shoe molding, too close?
If you want to go this route, why not put in a conventional border.
Strip or two of flooring (by wall), 3/4 or larger Walnut accent piece and another strip of flooring.
This way when you cut out for the border, it will not be so close to the wall to allow you room.
Start next to the field, and glue down or biscuit and glue down the first border piece then, proceed to the wall.

[Tim Devery]

PS: Use a polyurethane adhesive, it will stay flexible and allow the wood to move.

[John Hemenway]

Rich, aren't the nail holes too close to the edge to get a router in there?

Tim's idea is good and you could still buy the EZ to use on the end grain floorboards. You'll need some way of cutting them off straight to put in the border. There is (almost) always a way to justify new tools. :)

[Dino Makropoulos]

Hello,
I viewed the pics of the deck work on the EZ Smart website and it got me thinking.
I'm going to be redoing some hardwood floors that have tack-less strips nailed down.
Would it be possible to route say a 3/4" to 1" slot where the nail holes are and place a strip of a contrasting color wood in that slot?

No. The carpet strips are 1" from the wall.
I don't think you can use the SRK. If you have a trim router and you can rout close to the wall, covering the nail holes, we can use a short base on the SRK.

My idea would be to route and place the strip prior to sanding the floor, leaving the strips slightly proud. that way when the floor is sanded, everything will be even.

Great idea and easy to install borders 4"-5-6" from the wall.

(Please -please - please say yes! I want an excuse to buy the EZ Smart and this would be a perfect one ;))

Or am I better off just going the more pedestrian route of filling the nail holes?
Or is there some alternate method that would be better?

(Even though it's a rental unit, I'd love to have it dressed up to provide some visual appeal.)

Rich.
Filling the nail holes is easier.:cool:
Find another excuse.:rolleyes: :D

[Dan Mages]

The previous owner of my house covered the beautiful white oak flooring with nasty brown shag that was literally falling apart when it was removed. I hired my brother's friend to refinish the oak. He filled the holes with wood filler before the sanding and refinishing and now you cannot see where the tackless strips were. The only spots you see are the places where they doufus used 16d framing nails to hold the carpet in place.

Besides, holes and imperfections give wood charater.

Dan

[Howard Acheson]

I have seen it done but you must deal with the cross grain situation on two of the sides. The way it was done was to fit individual pieces of the contrasting wood with the grain direction the same as the grain direction of the flooring. That way the floor can expand/contract without restriction.

[Rich Engelhardt]

Hello and thanks,

No. The carpet strips are 1" from the wall.
They're supposed to be 1", but in this case they are more like 3" maybe even closer to 4" if I remove the shoe molding and baseboard molding.
I haven't torn into it yet, but I'm inclined to believe there may be two sets of nail holes to deal with.

Still too close for the router, but not the RotoZip w/a router bit.


Also visualize how the strip will look along with the shoe molding, too close?
I had some scrap pieces of pine about 1/4" thick and about 3/4" wide that I layed down yesterday to try to get an idea of what it would look like.
It did look a little odd having that narrow of a strip.
Two of them spaced about 3/4" of an inch apart looked really good though.

Oh well, it was a thought. Anyhow it's probably academic at this point since the budget isn't there for it, unfortunately.
Maybe the next house we do where the budget has a little more room in it.

[Dino Makropoulos]

Oh well, it was a thought. Anyhow it's probably academic at this point since the budget isn't there for it, unfortunately.
Maybe the next house we do where the budget has a little more room in it.


Rich.
3"-4" from the is ok.
If you need to play with the idea, we can send you a used SRK-Demo modified (short base) for this job.
Just return it ......with some pictures.
The idea is great if duable.

[Ben Grunow]

Use the guided system to cut the floor (end grain sides) an even distance from the wall and install a border (several flooring strips of the same species or with variations) and stagger the joints at the corners. This is a traditional way of installing floors and really looks nice but is a lot of work.

(Please send me 50% of the comission Dino)