Tongue issue on reclaimed oak flooring

[tsb]

I've been given some solid oak reclaimed flooring and have cleaned up the face and back removing any old varnish and glue. They are all oblong pieces, tongue and grooved but slightly differ in size (length and width) by a couple of mm here and there.

I'm hoping to glue them down on a concrete floor in a herringbone pattern, so I want them all to be the exact same size, by trimming them down on the table saw. By doing this though, it will remove the tongue. Will this cause a problem when I lay the pieces butted up to each other without the tongue and groove? I've seen old parquet flooring in the past without tongue and groove but my pieces are slightly larger at 350mm x 70mm.

If the answer is that it shouldn't be any problem what is the reason for the tongue and groove in the first place?

Apologies if this is a stupid question.

 

[Dee J]

Why not remove surplus from grooved edges - always plough/rout groove a bit deeper.

Dee

 

[AndyT]

T&G is normal on full size boards - it helps to keep the floor flat. But as far as I know it was never normal on parquet which uses much shorter, narrower pieces. The trad way of fixing parquet was to stick it down using pitch, onto a solid sub-floor, but I expect there are modern flexible adhesives now.
I think you should saw or plane off all your tongues if you are converting what used to be full sized boards into little parquet pieces.

 

[tsb]

I know what you mean but for some reason the tongues don't always line up quite as good as I would want with the groove. There's only 8 m2, which came from a pile of stock collected and stored over the years from a developer friend of mine, so even though they are all around the right size, the pieces might have come from a few different sources.

Basically, I just want to make them into straight,square, equal sized,blocks of wood and stick them on the floor but was wondering what problems I might have with not having tongue and grooves

 

[Lons]

Hi TSB

What I did a number of years ago though it was with 100 x 400mm lengths of oak which needed a lot of refurbishment was dimension it accurately and plane the surfaces then using my spindle moulder (router table would work) I cut a goove into all 4 edges and loose tongued with stips of 3mm ply glued in.
A lot of work but I felt worth while at the time.

Flooring was grooved face down to ensure accuracy and was laid for around 7 years before wifie decided she wanted something different.

As an aside: The flooring came out of an old terrace house had been laid in pitch and was about 60 years old. I didn't have time to do anything with it for 2 years so told the missus it needed to season and dry before I could fit it :^o
she believed it :roll: so good job she doesn't read these posts or I'd be in deep doodoo :lol:
cheers

Bob

 

[Ateallthepies]

I was on a job in London where they fitted an Oak floor in the manner you describe.

They first fixed 12mm ply on the sub-floor. Then they glued the Oak strips down and used headless pins as well.

Didn't see the glue they used or how they finished the floor or if they sanded after laying but it was very nice and the pins did not show at all!


Steve.

 

[softtop]

I have fitted a load of reclaimed oak parquet - some was 150 years old from an old church and it DID have T&G, plus I've seen quite a bit of reclaimed stuff and that's perfectly normal.

I have removed tongues where necessary to make the blocks a more equal size and (touch wood!) not had any problems.

I would use a decent (and expensive!) adhesive like Sikabond or Lecol, rather than Laybond which I think is less good.

Henry

 

[chipchaser]

Hi tsb,

Parquet was available as both plain square edge and with t&g edges. The latter would be more expensive but possibly perceived by the specifier as a better product. The t&g edge is unnecessary when laying fully bedded in glue on a solid floor but could provide more stability when fixed to a suspended floor, e.g a ply deck on joists. Tongue and grooved edges facilitate secret nailing through the tongue to a suitable substrate but I wouldn’t favour that myself for parquet although it’s good for boards.

As you say they “came from a pile of stock collected and stored over the years” and “the pieces might have come from a few different sources” variations in size can be expected. I am just making two pieces of replacement moulding for a shop front which appeared identical but the samples I cut off are actually different enough to make a challenge as they come together at a mitred joint.

If you need reassurance that cutting off the tongues is ok have a look at this site (both links take you to different pages from the same firm):

http://www.reclaimfloor.co.uk/parquet-f ... manchester

http://www.bitumenremoval.com/tandgremoval.html

Don’t forget that allowance needs to be made for movement of the timber around the edge of the floor, cork strips are the traditional solution.

Hope that is helpful

Graham

 

[Dibs-h]

tsb

Herringbone looks beautiful when done right - but it needs to be right. You need to centre the floor, otherwise unbalanced cuts on the sides looks wrong.

I did a floor some yrs back, reclaimed and each block had a groove on a long side and one short side, with a tongue on the other 2 sides.

https://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/post ... ht=#201973

might be useful.

HIH

Dibs

 

[tsb]

Thanks for all the advice. I've just showed SWMBO the pictures of your floor Dibs-- Damn, I wish I hadn't now! She wants me to do the same design with the border.
What glue did you use that stuck to the bitumen? If you can remember, because I didn't think anything stuck to that

 

[Dibs-h]

Thanks for all the advice. I've just showed SWMBO the pictures of your floor Dibs-- Damn, I wish I hadn't now! She wants me to do the same design with the border.
What glue did you use that stuck to the bitumen? If you can remember, because I didn't think anything stuck to that

I have a tub of it at home - will have a look see when I get in and post up the info.

The rest of us have learnt a long time ago - never show Wifey other folk's work! The quickest way to get a large headache! :lol:

Dibs