Hardwood Flooring Installation Tips!

Bring your new flooring into your home so that it can acclimate from where the flooring had been stored to what the new rooms normal relative humidity levels are going to be. If you install the new flooring right away and it had a higher moisture content within the boards problems can occur later with shrinkage leaving gaps between the boards. The opposite can also happen when the flooring is installed with the boards being too dry which then later on can absorb moisture and swell causing the edges to cup and or buckle. Normal seasonal changes in relative humidity levels can cause small seams to open and close which is to be expected and considered normal. Never store the wood flooring in areas prone to higher or low humidity levels.

When removing old carpet it is easier to pull it up from a corner of the room then fold it over itself 3-4 feet. Then using a utility knife cut strips off from the back side of the carpet to discard. Once the carpet is removed you will have to pull up and dispose of any carpet pad which is usually stapled down.

Once you have the old carpet and the pad removed you will be left with thin wooden strips (called Tackless) around the edges of the room which are nailed into the subfloor every 5 inches. These wood strips contain hundreds of very sharp barbed points that grabbed and held the edges of the carpet down. The trick to removing these wooden strips without splintering them is to gently tap a thin flat bar between the subfloor and the strip directly under each of the nails that hold the strip to the subfloor and just pop them up slightly. Do not try and pull the nails completely out or free the strip from the subfloor.  Continue doing this along the whole strip, when reaching the end of the strip the whole piece should lift from the floor easily.  We would recommend using heavy gloves when handling these wooden strips as the barbs are very sharp.

The easiest way to remove the hundreds of staples in the subfloor left from carpet installations is to slide a square edged shovel across the sub floor against the flat side of the staple. The force of the shovel should be enough to grab and pull the staple up from the subfloor. Some stubborn staples will have to be pulled from the floor using pliers or screwdriver wedged under them. Staples in sub floors that are going to be covered with new wood flooring that are found to be broken off and cannot be pulled will have to be driven flat with a hammer.

Once you have the old carpet and the pad removed you will be left with thin wooden strips (called Tackless) around the edges of the room which are nailed into the subfloor every 5 inches. These wood strips contain hundreds of very sharp barbed points that grabbed and held the edges of the carpet down. The trick to removing these wooden strips without splintering them is to gently tap a thin flat bar between the subfloor and the strip directly under each of the nails that hold the strip to the subfloor and just pop them up slightly. Do not try and pull the nails completely out or free the strip from the subfloor.  Continue doing this along the whole strip, when reaching the end of the strip the whole piece should lift from the floor easily.  We would recommend using heavy gloves when handling these wooden strips as the barbs are very sharp.

When installing wood flooring you are required to leave an expansion gap of approx 1/2 inch (depending on the manufacturer) around the edges of the room. To cover this expansion gap we recommend removing the wood baseboard and reinstalling it later on on top of the new flooring. To make this job easier find the end of a section of baseboard and gently work a stiff blade putty knife down from behind the molding and gently work the end of the baseboard loose. If you have a thin flat bar you can also use that. To avoid splitting do not try and pry the baseboard from the wall completely, once you have the end slightly loose gently work your way across to the other end of the baseboard where then it can then just easily be removed from the wall without fear of snapping the baseboard into pieces. 

Once you have that section of baseboard off use pliers and twist to pull the nails out from the back side of the boards so that it will not show holes on the face of the board. You should also number each piece of the base board and the wall it came off of so that after the new flooring is installed it can be easily be matched and re-installed to the wall it was removed from. 

If you decide that you do not want to remove the baseboards molding you can just simply install a 3/4 round molding over the expansion gap against the the existing baseboard as shown in the picture to the left. Most flooring styles offer a matching 3/4 round molding Or they can be painted to match your existing baseboard color. When nailing this 3/4 round molding, nail the molding into the bottom of the existing baseboard and not into the flooring.

You may have the older style sub flooring where 3/4 inch thick plank boards were used. Since solid planks will expand and contract along the long edges of the boards any wood flooring that is nailed down over this type of sub flooring has to be installed with the new floor boards running across the width of the sub floor planks so that normal expansion and contraction of the individual subfloor planks does not pull the new floorboards apart later. If this direction is not desired then a layer of 3/8 inch plywood should be installed glued and screwed to the old planks to act as a buffer or slip sheet. 

Today the more common sub floor material used in home building is cdx exterior grade plywood. There are two thicknesses offered in cdx plywood either 5/8 or 3/4 inch thick. 3/4 inch thick is preferred for added strength and support for your new flooring. If you have 5/8 inch plywood and your using a thinner wood floor than say 1/2 inch you may want to glue and screw a layer of 3/8 underlayment down for added stability.

Subfloors can become loose and squeak with age so before installing any wood flooring the entire subfloor should be checked for any repairs,  fixing problems in subfloors after the flooring has been installed can be difficult. Questionable areas should be re secured to the floor joists using 2-1/2 inch long deck screws (not sheet rock screws). The more solid and secure your subfloor is the better the hardwood flooring installation will come out. Any areas within the subfloor that sink when walked on should be re supported from below using 2 x 6 blocks of wood secured between the floor joists if possible. Plywood subflooring should be flat, run a string the entire length of the room in different areas. Any depressions within the subfloor that exceed 1/4 inch in 8’ should be filled using a floor leveler. Any high spots should be sanded flat.

Since the underside of wood flooring is not protected by any finish coating it is virtually unprotected from any moisture migration we highly recommend laying 15 lb. black hardwood flooring paper down over any wood subfloors no matter what level the flooring is going to be installed on overlapping the seams by 4-6 inches doing this will help retard any moisture that may migrate up from damp basements or other areas within the home. This felt paper can be stapled in place or held in place by objects as the flooring is installed.

In addition to using 15 lb black felt paper an optional step can be taken to further reduce moisture transfer by first applying one to two coats of fast drying Shellac to seal the surface of the plywood subfloor.

If your installing 3/4 inch thick solid wood flooring you will need to either rent or purchase a larger flooring nailer that is either a manual nailer that you swing and strike the top of the gun with a steel mallet several times to drive the cleat nail. 

Or... you can rent or purchase a air assisted pneumatic nail gun and compressor where you strike the top of the nailing gun with a rubber mallet once which activates the air which drives the cleat or staple into the wood. The pneumatic nailer either the cleat nail style or staple style makes the job of nailing the flooring down easier. 

Both types of nailers have a guide along the bottom  front edge of the gun that keeps it aligned so that they will drive the nail or staple in the proper position along the inside top of the tongue of the boards. Both types of nailers can have an inter changeable base plate for thinner flooring.

When using 1/2 inch or thinner solid wood flooring or thinner engineered flooring you will need to rent or purchase an easy pull trigger stapler that is also run by a small compressor to drive staples into the top inside edge of the tongue of the flooring. These type of nailing guns have an adjustable base plate to accommodate different board thicknesses. (naturally click lock or direct down installations are not nailed)

When starting the installation the first 2-4 rows of flooring you will not be able to fit in and use either of the nailers noted above. You will have to either pre-drill the boards and hand nail or you can use an air assisted finish nailer that uses a small compressor to drive nails either down through the top of the boards and/or if held at the proper angle blind nail on the inside edge of the tongues of the floor boards this is also true when installing your last rows of flooring against the finishing walls . The installation goes a lot faster using an air assisted finish nailer which uses the same small compressor as the above flooring nailers. 

Proper nailing is essential to avoid any problems later. We suggest face nailing every 8 inches along the back side of the starting row and then blind nail every 6-8 inches along the tongue of every board thereafter staying 4 inches in from each end of the board to prevent the splitting of the wood boards.