Thread: Making T&G floorboards

I reckon you'd need:

1 A jointer.

2 A thicknesser

3 A spindle moulder with a power feed or

4 A good router table with a good router and a set of quality bits

5. The time to do it.


If it were me I'd go for the buck fifty a metre option.

Dave,
I have all the items in Craig's list, well not #5 but that's not really an item and I still wouldn't do it myself. I'd only consider running floorboards myself if I had a big 4header machine. You certainly won't buy the required equipment for $2400 and you'd still need to find the time to do it. Also flooring is usually made of kiln dried stock, any shrinkage is going to show up in the finished floor.

Mick

Hi Dave

I've just done a similar exercise my self with 300 lineal meters of wall pannelling for a friends new house. Used item 1, 2 and 5 to get the rough sawn timber into dressed form then got a t&g profile run by a local joinery shop ( who was doing the kitchen units for the house anyway). Expect to spend a lot of Item 5 if you are doing it with home workshop gear. Running 10 boards for a project is easy, running 100 is a mission, running 1000....

This project was done to make feature walls using timber from the house site, so we felled, sawed, dried and machined the wood ourselves.

I guess the real question is do you want to set up a decent wood shop? (and do you have time to use it?) It can be done, but contracting it out to someoen with heavy duty machinery might be a better option.

With 80mm wide boards, several years air drying and t&g profile I dont think you will have a big problem with shrinkage. If you let the finished boards acclimatise in the house for a few weeks before you lay them that will help too.

This is how the wall is looking now

Cheers

Ian

G'day.
Do you realise the amount of skill and equipment needed to produce accurate T&G hardwood flooring?

If you want it to look like a A grade job, buy the T&G.

Or do it your self and see how many grey hairs you end up with.

Hooroo.
Regards, Trevor
Grafton.
P.S. glue & nail T&G to Yellow Tongue particle board with Bostik Ultraset Glue and secret nail.......No worries......It is being done every day by most floor installers.

Pay someone to run it for you and check the specs carefully before you lay it.
Flooring can easily go so, so wrong. You won't regret it.

Cheers,
Rus.

Hi Guys, Many thanks for your thoughts, given the amount I have to do at the moment and the number of grey hairs I already have I'll go with the consensus and leave it to a professional.
Since its usually best to crawl before you can walk, I'll plan to start off with some basic gear and tackle some of the smaller building jobs instead. Regards,
Dave H

We produce T&G flooring on 6 head moulder in our timber yard from KD stock that we buy in from mills which dry it to our specs. Our heads for the moulder cost over 5k let alone the rest of the machine, you require a decnet size machine with a straightenting table built in, if you simple run the boards through with side heads the boards will not come out spot on.

THe actual T&G profile is hard to get 100% cause if it is out by 1mm the floor will move and mkae noises.

Laying over particlebaord is ok, as early said use a flexible timber flooring adhesive such as ultraset or sika bond T55, try to keep the particle board dry so that the corners of the sheet dont swell.

If you do use the air dryed boards try to let it them settle in for a few weeks but dont do what some builders do and not have the house up to lock up stage and the conditions are not similar to those when the house is finshed.

Good luck, i will ask a supplier of ours in qld if they can run the boards for you and advise on the forum.

I reckon just buy some premade stuff and keep the blackbutt for future furniture making.