I’ve been making furniture for about 20 years as hobby. I’ve sold a few things here and there, but I’m definitely not a professional. I’ve refinished hardwood floors a few times, although I realize that’s pretty far from installing them. I have all the tools I’d need, except for a floor sander that I can rent.
Here’s why I think I might not be totally crazy. We were planning to put in wide-plank, solid wood, distressed floors. Either reclaimed wood or hand distressed. So if my seams don’t turn out perfect everywhere, it should be ok with the aged look. And if we use 8 “- 10” planks, it means a lot less pieces to install.
The current floors are 2" wide solid oak, but they might be as much as 90 years old (no one was sure when we bought the place), and they’ve been sanded so many times there isn’t enough left for another refinishing. Some nails are pooping out already.
I’ll answer, since no one else has. Yes, by all means, do it yourself. Just take some time over the planning. Your room is probably not perfectly square, so if you’re not careful with your layout, you’ll end up needing notably wedge-shaped pieces at the end. Pay attention to transitions to the next room, so you know how to tackle those before you start.
Also, think about how your floor will interact with door trim and the like. Are you planning to remove the existing floor? Does it go under or against the trim? It’s a lot faster if you trim out *after *you put the floor down, because then you can get the trim to cover the gaps. That’s generally the right way to go anyway, because it better accommodates expansion and contraction of the floor.
As to fastening, follow the recommendations of the floor manufacturer. You’ll usually find yourself needing to rent a floor nailer and compressor.
And lastly, if you put down so-called hand-scraped floors, or otherwise distressed floors, you won’t be sanding. That would ruin the whole point.
Thanks for the advice. I was looking at some really old, really distressed barn wood, with chunks of moss and whatnot on some of the pieces. So I thought I might want to sand it some so that it’s not too contrasty. Although I could be wrong about that. With furniture it seems like it takes quite a lot of sanding to get rid if deep grooves and discoloration, so I figured it would hold up to some sanding without losing the rustic nature, but those floors sanders are pretty powerful, so maybe I’m off the mark on that.
Follow up question: Can you lay down down planks without tongue and groove? I saw a floor in a restaurant that literally looked like normal 2 x 6 fir. I mean there were some gaps between planks and visible nails all over the place. It was a very rustic look, but it seemed pretty sturdy, and I thought it would be cheap as dirt for the materials.
Follow up question #2: You mentioned you can end up with wedge shaped pieces if you don’t take into account the irregularities of the room. Even if you do figure that out beforehand, how do you handle it other than wedge shapes? Leave big enough gaps and hide them under the baseboards? I was planning to tear out the ones in there now and put in new baseboards after the floor like you suggested.
Looks like we’re going to remodel the kitchen first, so I’ll have a few months to keep researching this. I watched a number of Youtube videos, but they all seem to be geared around installing engineered floors.
If you’re really planning on using distressed, reclaimed wood, as opposed to those floors sold by flooring retailers as “handscraped,” then yeah, you’ll probably have to sand, and fairly aggressively to get the scruff off. But I might caution against using that kind of wood anyway, because it’s probably pretty soft, and pretty beat up, and probably split-prone.
Tongue and groove is not strictly necessary. The reason floorboards are traditionally T&G is that the tongue provides a place to hide the nails (they’re driven at an angle where the plane of the tongue intersects with the rest of the floorboard), and because T&G helps hold the floorboards flat, without cupping. So absent T&G, you have to face-nail, meaning the nails will be visible, and you’re liable to having the boards cup, which, with wide boards, can be a nuisance, and can cause nails to come loose in time.
T&G also limits the travel of dust and dirt through the floor and into the ceiling below. If you simply butt the boards against each other, you get gaps that can open with time, or seasonally, and that collect dirt.
As to 2 x 6 fir, you can do that, though I don’t imagine it’s actually all that cheap. And you’d end up with a pretty thick floor, which means you might have trouble with trim, or with transitions to other rooms, unless you do the whole floor that way.
As to wedge-shaped pieces: imagine you have a room that’s an inch wider on one end. If you just lay floorboards of a constant width one after the other, at the very end, you’ll find yourself with a gap to fill that’s one inch larger on one end of the room than the other. Now, maybe that’s not a huge problem, and you can hide it with the trim, but it’s a bit more artful to make an incremental adjustment with every piece you lay down. Those tiny adjustments add up to your inch across the width of the floor. That’s why it’s good to know at the outset where the irregularities lie.
Homeowner with moderate “handyman” abilities here. I had a flooring company come and do a Bruce hardwood floor in my dining room. Turned out pretty good, but I kept thinking as I watched them “hell, I could do this”.
Flash forward 2 years, and I’m ready to do the rest of the 1st floor which consists of a largish living room, two hallways, and a powder room. Bought the wood, and did it myself. I had a fireplace hearth to work around, 4 different room transitions, and the bathroom plumbing to work around.
End result, my work looks better than the professionals. Probably partly because I was able to spread the work over several days, whereas they had another job site to get to. Nonetheless, my rooms have better joints, and (if I say so myself) the transitions are damn nicely done.
Not sure about all the implications of using plank or recycled wood, but if you’re good at basic carpentry, I would say go for it.