Hello, my name is Tom Ryan, I’m new to the knots forums and would like some advice from folks with shaper experience. First of all, my new project involves cutting my own flooring for my bedroom. I plan on using brazilian cherry. What in you opinion would be the best shaper cutters to use to cut the tongue and groove joints on the boards? I plan on buying rough lumber planing it down to 3/4 and ripping boards of varying width, from 2-4 inches. (Do I need to joint these boards since the floor is going to be uneven anyway?) I then want to use my shaper and power feeder to cut the joints. Are there any pitfalls I need to be aware of? I was going to do the bedroom first before I do the rest of the house, for a test.
BTW, the advice on this forum is first rate.
Thanks
Tom
Replies
Check over on breaktime where floors are discussed in more detail. I recall from one thread that it is important to chamfer the toungue in a particular way to keep the joint stable. You might search under floors and milling.
How much are you going to let the width vary? Unless you mill the boards into a small number of consistent widths, you might end up having alot of end-joints lining up to compensate for uneven board widths, which IMHO would create a funky pattern. I have a 13 ft room where they seemed to alternate 12 ft boards from opposite walls, and having the large number of joints in a similar position really distracts from the over all look. I could see it being much worse with having a number of adjacent ends placed next to eachother.
Tom
CMT make a tongue and groove router bit set #855.506.11 in the catalogue I'm looking at.
Ideally the boards in your floor should all be the same width otherwise the floor will always look patched. A 2 in board will translate to about 1 1/2 in cover - the distance between visible edges - this is very narrow, normal cover is about 3 1/4 in. With very careful board placement it will work, but do you have the time and patience - when you figure in the time required to get the boards right it's probably much easier to start with a consistent board width. Yes you should joint the boards first. Once the floor is laid you will want to sand it level - this is much easier if the borads are jointed first. Because of the sanding you may want to only plane down to 7/8 first and get close to 3/4 after the sanding. BTW secret nailing looks real flash.
Ian
Ian,
Haven't you ever heard of random width flooring? This is pretty common.
TDF
This would be my concern. 2 set-ups. 1 for the tongue and 1 for the groove.
Each needs to be repeatable. Otherwise the board sits up and the tongue cracks, etc. So whichever cutter set you purchase needs to be adjusted to a master setup board and repeated. Obviously the first cut will be one setup and the second cut will be the mateing piece. You'll flip flop your setups over and over. If you are dealing with the ends with the same tongue & groove then you need a router or a second shaper to make this efficient.
I have to ask, is the rough sawn more cost effective? You can buy it precut (not finished) for about 3.75 /ft the last I saw. Even Red oak is cheaper in precut than in the rough form. As a testimony I built speaker cabinets in college out of Red Oak flooring as it was cheaper than using standard planks. Waste is certainly less.
But there is always the Machismo. You can't get that from precut flooring.
Sounds like fun.
PS (edit) As for the cutters, I would look to rockwell or any others suggested but I'd buy the matching set in both router and shaper. (4 pieces) It would help out in the setup. As an example I bought two routers for dovetail cutting as the setup was driving me to distraction. This flooring would be far worse than the dovetail jig.
Edited 12/30/2002 11:16:50 AM ET by Booch
You'll flip flop your setups over and over.
why do you need to? Having thicknesssed all the boards, cut all the tongues (including one on the end of each board, if required) then cut all the grooves (including that at the opposite end to the tongue). T&G cutters are designed to cut centered on the board, so having cut all the tongues you only have to tune once for the grooves. Of course you'll need a hold down to ensure that each board stays in alignment with the cutter. Remember that as you look at a finished board there'll be a tongue on the north and west edges and a groove on the east and south edges. Factory manufactured T&G also has a shallow rebate (about 1/16 in deep) on about 1/3 of the underside.
If you're really into machismo, you could cut all the T&Gs with a matched set of hand planes or a multi plane.
The main reason I want to do this is because I can :). We all could buy manufactured furniture as well, but what would be the point of that? My master plan includes making all the door jambs, interior doors, floor molding, and window casings. All suited very well to the shapers capabilities. BTW, I plan on using a power feeder for all the flooring cuts, with the exception of the ends, I'll have to make a jig. Also, I know I could buy Oak cheaply, but I don't want oak, I was planning on making the floors out of chechen or brazilian cherry. dunno if I can find that stuff pre-milled. Also, since I do plan on selling this house, I'm not sure if parquet would be a good idea, most people I know prefer regular strip flooring to parquet. Who in your opinion makes the best wing shaper cutters? Amana? Freud? Thanks for all the input so far.
-Tom
Tom,
Why strip flooring? -- if you are starting with sawn timber make a parquet floor. The preparation will be about the same as you won't need T&G and you could have a different pattern for each room.
For design ideas try Ken Fisher's site here or at my site here.
IanDG
Tom,
Fairly ambitious project in terms of scale, but fairly simple to execute. What size shaper have you got. Hope you have a DC.
I would run all one setup at a time, as someone said earlier. The power feeder is a good idea. You will have to joint the boards because they will need to justify to the shaper fence unless you use a bearing guide bit to do the tongue and groove. If you use the bearing guide, I don't see the need to joint the boards. The aniler will pull them together(obviously within reason).
TDF
I have a 3 HP Delta Limited Edition Shaper,and a 1 HP Delta Power Feeder. I was going to cut the tongue on one pass for each of the boards and the groove on one pass after the tongues were cut. I was also wondering if I should do one milling operation at a time, eg, give the wood a chance to acclimate between milling to reduce expansion/contraction etc.
-Tom
You gotten a lot of good advice from everybody here. The only thing I can add is make sure you use a flooring T&G cutter. A regular T&G doesn't have the reliefs and are to tight. Someone here at Knots bought a set from Grisly. I've installed BC local mill long length 6" wide no end match, with no problem. I glue and nail everything over 2 1/4" wide
I've never milled my own flooring (not cost affective) so I don't know of any other source. You can, have it made. Look in your local phone book.
I was also wondering if I should do one milling operation at a time, eg, give the wood a chance to acclimate between milling to reduce expansion/contraction etc.
No! you don't need to, rut it all. But let it acclimate in you house at least a week or longer before you install it. And let it set after to.
Jeff in so cal
66 f---38%
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