filling gaps in old floor boards

[graisme]

hi all
really hoping someone out there will be able to shed some light on this prob for me;
i have a large 140 year old apartment on the second floor of a building in a cold climate. 6 years ago we filled the gaps between the 6 inch floor boards with 'stuff' but now most of it has shrunk or come away, leaving it cold.

at the time, i researched what to use and the best the shops could tell me was some kind of pink filler which went on pink and stayed pink, even after sanding and sealing. consequently, i tried the clear silicone stuff which didn't work well either. both types have not stood up to time or wear. recently, i even tried liquid nails between the boards.....that totally shrunk.

so what is the best product to use to fill the gaps between the floorboards to stop the cold coming in? my whole living area thru the dining and kitchen is floorboards. i don't want to vinyl it and tiles would be freezing, plus i love the look of the floorboards. they are the LEAST housework-necessary flooring i have ever had except that now there is substantial cold coming through.

what do the professional floor sanders use? i can't believe they use the pink stuff as it looks awful. as the boards are wide and old, some of the gaps are fairly substantial; 3-5mm wide.

thanks all
grace

 

[wylie]

We pulled up carpet in a previous PPOR to find that the hardwood flooring was laid butted up to each other with no tongue or groove, so had shrunk a little and was going to look gappy. Our floor sander told us that whatever he used would shrink and pop out in little pieces as the timber moved and shrunk and expanded with the room temperatures.

Our solution was to have our kitchen cabinetmaker mill us thin strips of the timber our kitchen was being made from (New Guinea Rosewood) and we had our builder use a router set to a shallow depth and he routed out the gap between each board with a border around the edge of the room about six inches in from the walls.

The builder then used liquid nails to set the rosewood strips into the routed sections and the border around the two rooms. The nearest thing to explain how it looked was like those lovely old boats with the black rubbery stuff between each board.

It cost very little and it looked stunning once it was sanded and sealed. It turned a problem into a real talking point. If I can find a photo I will, but I am not sure where they are.

 

[depreciator]

That would have looked great, Wylie. Alot of work, though. Grace, go to a ship chandler (place that sells stuff for boats) and see what they have. There will be the black caulking that Wylie mentioned, but it comes in other colours. Products made for boats are usually very good because of what they have to withstand. Of course, having owned old timber boats, I can tell you that those boat products are also always expensive.
Scott

 

[csc]

when we had pine floors sanded, the guy used the fine dust from the sander to fill in cracks before sealing...worked a treat actually....u would never know after a sealing coat and two top coats...

mind you they were not big cracks either....

 

[wylie]

We looked into the caulking they use on boats, but I think from memory we didn't go with this because it wouldn't have sanded well. A bit like trying to sand silicone perhaps?

The cost to us for the floor was one builder's time to rout the floor, probably half a day and the other half a day was glueing, so it was pretty cheap. Our kitchen guy only charged us a little for the timber because he was a great guy who we sent a lot of customers to.

Sander just sanded the whole floor, so probably much cheaper because the tradies were already there and it was just another little job to do.

 

[depreciator]

Yes, the caulking wouldn't sand. So the caulking would have to be done after sanding. And you wouldn't want to have to sand too much again. I'd love to see a photo of that floor, Wylie.
Scott

 

[graisme]

thanks all for your replies. i got quite excited about the idea of boat caulking until i discovered it can't be sanded.
wylie; routing and strips is a great idea but more than i want to do now. some of my gaps are substantial and lots of others are small. i would be concerned that in time, the strips would shrink/expand (meaning creak) and not seal. i need some kind of sealing compound that i can sand over and reseal with the matt clear finish and preferably something which doesn't crumble and come up like the pink 'stuff' has. by the way, that was recommended by a tradie....

 

[graisme]

got your names wrong guys, apologies. am at work....

 

[gecho1]

flooring

Graisme,
What Wylie has mentioned would be about the best scenario short of layning down a floating floor or the like. I often use this same principle when i have removed a wall from a fitted floor, Especially if the wall ran perpendicular to the flooring. Rather than re-lay the boards we would lay a similar board in the missing section and trim out with a contrasting timber. If you can't hide it, accentuate it ; )

CSC- I also use this system for small cracks on a lot of furniture as well as flooring. Prior to your final sand (120 - 180 grit) smear/push some glue into the crack or joint, and thn sand over. The sawdust sticks to the glue leaving a "Putty" that si exactly the same colour as the timber. That said anything more than a 1mm gap will not work for long.

You could try using caulk in colours (Bunnings) it will stop the draft, however it will still look ordinary.

I believe the best bang for buck would be Wylie suggestionhttp://www.somersoft.com/forums/images/icons/icon7.gif

Hope this helps

Adrien Mamet
www.mametconstructions.com.au

 

[LynnH]

Adrien

Could you please put a space between 'suggestion' and the url so we can click to access that piccie of wylie's floor? My brain has turned to mush this afternoon and I couldn't remember the url if I tried and I'm technologically incompetent.

Thank you!

Cheers
LynnH

 

[wylie]

I had a little trip down memory lane today as I tried to find a photo of the floor. All I could find was a photo of the floor with the strips inserted, ready to sand.

You have to use your imagination, but the lighter part in the centre was the original untouched floor. The darker outer edges had been "japanned" or stained. The main floor looks very dark where the japanning was done and the rosewood strips look lighter.

When sanded all the colours are reversed. The floorboards came up in gorgeous golden pine, the rosewood was medium dark. Of course, the section in the middle will always look a different shade but we had two oriental style rugs that went in the middle of the room so not really a problem.

I wish I could find a finished photo, but I just couldn't find one today, though I did relive lots of other fantastic memories.

 

[gecho1]

Floor

Sorry Lynne,
that url was not the pic of Wylie's floor, twas but a mere smiley gone wrong
(It is monday after all). Sorry
That said i would love to seea pic too, so how bout it Wylie???

Mean time i will try to access the floo i did

cheers

Adrien

www.mametconstructions.com.au

 

[LynnH]

That's OK, Adrien! Seems that it's the afternoon for the computer gremlins to have their 'fun'.

Cheers
Lynn

 

[LynnH]

Wylie

From that photo, it looks really lovely! A creative and unusual solution to your problem!!!

Cheers
Lynn

 

[wylie]

Thanks Lynne. It was a queenslander with four large french doors between the two same sized living rooms. We moved the doors to the new opening onto the new back deck and did both rooms the same. So this was taken showing one half of the double room with the other half behind the camera. It did look great once sanded.

Funniest memory was that for the two weeks that we moved in with my parents while the floors were sanded, hubby was getting anxious to get back into our own home. We moved back in on a Saturday (from memory) and he was lining me up for a romantic first night home. Unfortunately, Princess Diana's funeral was on the telly and really wasn't putting me in the mood for luuuurve. I watched him just get more and more downcast as the day wore on .

 

[LynnH]

Wylie

We're planning to do a reno on an old Queenslander in Greenslopes later this year. It has carpet in the main bedroom, sleepout and study and I just know when we pull the carpet up that we're going to find a mess - you can see that from under the house.

Seeing your photo has got my brain going off at a tangent (lateral thinking? daydreaming? not sure ...). I was thinking that we may have to pull up large quantities of floorboards (they're cedar) and re-lay them ..... but now I'm thinking there are definitely other possibilities! (Hubby ain't going to like this one! )

Would send kudos, but I have to spread them around!!!

Cheers
Lynn

 

[wylie]

I cannot fathom why anybody in the dim, dark past would have covered up cedar floorboards. Whatever you do, they will look fabulous. I don't think I have ever seen a house with cedar floorboards. How lucky for you to have them. I am quite jealous.

 

[LynnH]

Beats me, too, wylie! The floors in the lounge, dining, entry and kitchen are polished and look wonderful, although they do need to be sanded back and re-finished.

The house also has beautiful silky oak doors and windows - some of them are natural, some painted white, and the windows in one room are painted black!!!

Some people's ideas of renos in the past leave a lot to be desired!

Cheers
Lynn

 

[Alabex]

try Automotive filler/putty. Most of them can be sanded and it is so strong it works a treat. My dad works as a handyman and has done all manner of building related things in his 70 odd years. He put me on to it when i wanted to fill some massive chips in doorframes and on edges of our attic ceilings. It has worked fantastically.. to the point where i now refuse to use most other spac fills or no more gaps... i now will only use the automotive stuff.

 

[ethereal]

We too use automotive filler in vast quantities and it had been fantastic to fill large gaps in the timber floors. It doesn't pop out, sands and varnishes well with anything, but.... it isn't a great colour, in fact it is pinkish too. I wouldn't use it over a whole gappy floor because it would probably stick all the boards together preventing necessary movement, and it might look a bit odd due to the colour. I recall the first really cold night after doing our floors being woken to these exteremely loud cracking and snapping sounds. It was the floorboards breaking apart where the 2-pack varnish had 'glued' them, due to the shrinking effects of the cold air. Nothing visible to the eye though.

If I were you, and liking the look of the old boards, I would consider fixing some ply or fibre cement sheeting to the undersides of the boards between the joists to stop the air movement and leave the top, gaps and all. You'd keep the rustic looking floor and make it airtight. This is assuming you can get to the undersides of the boards though.