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Here's an
example of a premium custom hand scraped
floor we sold to a local customer in 2007.
The location was a high end clubhouse in a
golf course development in Fort Myers,
Florida. Considering our business was close
to the job I wanted some nice pictures to
show off the floor on the website. Prior to
the sale the customer claimed they had
installers lined up for the job, but what
kind of installers I wondered? Or better yet
did the installers know what they were
doing?
Pictures Tell a Thousand Words!
This is a classic example of somebody trying
to save a few bucks in what is a highly
visible country club
setting. Sorry folks I will not get into
details of the builder name or exact
location because it makes me sick just
thinking about it. May I be blunt Real
skilled idiots the way I look at it. The
moment I walked in the door without looking
at the newly installed area red flags were
waving.
Not only did they fail to use the proper
amount of adhesive required to glue down
hardwood floors, but the method in which the
floor was started was wrong. Needless to say
I did not want to stay around long. After
all the people that bought the flooring said
they had installers lined up for the job.
And It Gets Worse!
I would hazard a guess even the most
uneducated consumer can figure out what's
wrong in the picture below. Give up? These
skilled idiots were too lazy to handle this
job in any way remotely proper. Hardwood
flooring should be installed with each plank
being staggered from one another and not
lined up where the end joints meet up with
each other! They should also be installed in
rows, not columns!
Let's look at
a few other aspects of this classic hack
job. Not only does the photo on the right
show a large
area of light colored boards that have been
installed, but it is approaching a stairwell
that steps down. Whenever hardwood runs
off a stairway it is installed starting
at the stair nosing made for the floor. The
stair nosing is affixed to the subfloor then
hardwood is installed against it, providing
a tight and seamless fit.
I
have no clue how these guys worked this one
out. I would guess they ran the flooring
over the first step down, chopped it off
with a circular saw and installed the nosing
somehow.
A
few other items if some of you do it
yourselfers should run into a similar
situation. In the first picture the floor
was installed around the column, but these
yahoos left out some smaller pieces that
have to be cut to fit. I noticed how they
handled this situation, but it was a joke. A
piece was cut and I noticed one guy was
trying to pound it into place with a rubber
mallet. These floors are tongue and groove
on all sides. It's not going to fit buddy!
He did realize the problem, then separated a
few boards, while getting glue everywhere,
finally getting it into place.
Proper Method
Chances are you may hear differing views on
how to stagger. Instead of mentioning a
distance one end joint
has in relation to another in the next row
or adjoining rows, try to use as much space
as possible. It will be much harder if
you're working with material consisting of
many short pieces, but keep an eye on where
they are being placed even if you're four or
five rows away from the first one.
For nailed types floors staggering is
accomplished when laying out the area or as
professionals call racking. This not only
allows for proper placement of end joints
but gives one an idea of any color
variations, or clumps of light and dark
colored boards that may become too obvious.
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