Note to reader: This is going to be a Loooong post, but I am going to try to be as detailed as possible for anyone who stumbles upon this and wants to read about the project. Also, there is the occasional off color joke and naughty word, so if you get bent about that sort of thing, you may want to just skip this. Or lighten up, either way is fine.
So here at
Flyover Farm, decisions are based, first and foremost, on what is best for the equine residents.
Examples of these decisions are; where to live, what properties to purchase, what gets built, and what gets renovated. The humans here are usually last on the list. This basically means that, as long as the people have a roof over their head and shelter from the wind, they are pretty much okay with that. The house is secondary to the other buildings that everyone spends their time in.
So anyway, while Allison concentrates on the training the horses, and Penny helps with barn chores and grounds keeping, I've decided that I get to play with the house. Never mind that I don't actually live there, I consider it my DIY playground between work projects and the actual residents of Flyover basically let me do what I want.
The house itself is a manufactured home that was built and decorated in what I estimate was the early 80s and has not been updated since. Think brown carpet, chunky wood accents, pastels, plastic bathtubs, and all walls made out of shitty paneling. My only assumption is that the OG owner ALSO cared more about the other buildings than he did the house. Houses out here seem to be after thoughts since everyone is out playing in the shops and barns.
So of course I have spent lots of time on
Pinterest looking for ways to fix up the house on a budget. I became obsessed with the idea of laying plywood floors, a project that kept coming up in my feed. While Penny kept talking about putting down laminate or new carpeting, I really wanted to try this instead. So many people have some how managed to make them look amazing, while saving a BUNCH of money over the hardwood options. And lets be real, carpeting is gross. This would also give me a chance to start using all the new tools I've been buying and putting them to an actual practical use. Thus far the only thing I have had the chance to build was a set of Corn-hole boards.
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| Shameless Brag |
But enough of the lead up. First things first.
The Room:
"Master" Bedroom. What was originally a master suite (technically, it still is, but it's obviously a work in progress). The bedroom is approx 11X13 (I measured more accurately later of course, but for the sake of description, I'll make it rounder numbers). There is also a full bath attached which has been
mostly gutted so the only thing it is currently being used for is if someone has to make a wee/doody and the other bathroom is occupied. The bath tub and shower has not been used once since they bought the house because, it was straight up gross and sketchy.
Alli and Penny had already done a bunch of work on the room and floor, including pulling out all the old carpeting, yanking out all the stupid nails and staples and trying to get all the tufts of carpeting away from the edges since they basically carpeted the whole house and THEN built the walls on top. Super. Effing. Annoying. Allison then spread a layer of
Kilz on the (sub) floor to combat moisture, mildew, funk, what have you.
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| Bedroom as it was in property listing. |
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| Bedroom after it was gutted and covered in Kilz |
Materials:
Plywood. Brother-from-another-mother Brenden (and his pickup) was kind enough to go to
Home Depot with me to help me pick out boards and of course, haul them back to the farm. We went for the cheapest stuff we could find, for the lowest price, since I knew I was going to be doing an ass load of sanding anyway. Why pay for pre-sanded boards when I needed the practice? Also, why pay for it? This was part of the whole plywood challenge! We decided to go for
these particular boards, which were basically the shittiest plywood sheets I could find, in the thickness I wanted (approx 1/2 in.). FYI, 1/2 inch was just what I picked on a whim. I didn't want it too thick, and I was unsure about the stability if I went thinner. Pick the thickness that works for YOU, your room, your house. There is no "right" answer here (in hind sight, I probably would have gone with 1/4 in)! Brenden and I pawed through the entire pile picking out the best nine sheets we could find while the Home Depot zombies stood around watching these two stinky hooligans tossing their plywood around and judging it harshly (we had been sanding Brenden's banister all day and were definitely getting our funk on). We did put it all back by the way, we aren't total barbarians. I also knew that I was going to rip these sheets into planks myself so I opted NOT to ask HD to make the cuts for me. Again, I need the cutting practice, and didn't want to pay them to do the cuts. I wanted to do as much of this project completely by myself as I could.
Total - 14.33 X 9 = $128.97 + tax.
Floor Glue. I knew I was going to need some Liquid-Nails type thing but hey,
Loctite was cheaper! I purchased a case, knowing I wouldn't use it all on a room of this size, but that I would NEVER run out of ways to use it. Especially if the floors turn out and I will want to do more rooms.
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| Lots and Lots of GLUE |
A case of these tubes was about 47.00. You can buy them by the tube for about 2.50 - 4.00, depending on where you go (shop around, or order on Amazon?). I've noticed there are also sales pretty frequently. Ex: 2 for 5.00, etc.
Brad Nails. I bought 3 packs of 18g, 2in brad nails. Each pack contains 1,000 nails that come in strips you load into your brad nail gun (assuming you have one, more on this later). I did NOT use them all! In fact, I think I used one whole pack since I was sort of a nail minimalist. We'll see how that works out. I asked opinions on which sort of nails I should be using. My Uncle Phil thought that I should use a nail with a head on it (FYI: brad nails do not have heads, they are more like big pins) in case the floor bowed up. His thinking was that if there was any bowing, the brad would be pulled out. Or rather, the board would pull itself OFF the brad nail. Totally logical theory! Our good friend Keith (he of
shed building skillzzzz) stated that a brad would do the job just fine since plywood is actually incredibly stable, and the floor glue should put the kibosh on any bowing that DOES happen (which in reality, is supposed to be very minimal). Since the air compressor I purchased came with the brad nail gun, I went with the brads. I figured if for some reason there WAS a lot of movement, I could always lay down some headed nails at a later date. I wasn't in the mood to splash out more green for a second nail gun either.
Dewalt Circular Saw w/Kreg Rip Cut Guide. Look, obviously you can use any brand of tools you want, or have, or work for you. I am merely pointing out which tools I have, and what I like. Thus far in my tool buying journey, I have stuck pretty close to DeWalt. The two reasons for this are 1) Keith is a carpenter so his opinion on tools carries a lot of weight with me and I usually consult him before I make tool purchases. He usually signs off on any DeWalt stuff I am considering and warns me if something doesn't have a good reputation 2) They also get very good reviews on Amazon. Do your research before you buy, but again, there are no right or wrong things to buy.
To be honest, it would definitely has been easier to do the rip cuts (cuts made ALONG the grain of the wood, aka "the long way") with a table saw, no question. However, a few notes on this. I do not OWN a table saw and did not really want to buy one at this particular time. In addition, I do not have a proper workbench/ table to put it on so it could be used safely (workbench is one of my next building projects). Table saws CAN be dangerous, duh, and since I have ZERO experience using one, I felt that perhaps this was not the time to start experimenting with one on my own without first getting a good tutorial from someone more experienced. Even the most experienced users can still injure themselves pretty badly, even when they are using proper safety precautions, as Keith can attest to this.
Do not click if you are squeamish.
So instead of buying a table saw, I purchased a
Kreg Rip Cut Guide, which is a plastic and metal accessory that you attach to your circular saw with screws.
You can then adjust the ruler guide to the width you want to cut and lock it in place so your cuts stay consistent. You WILL have to make practice cuts and make adjustments since all saws are structured a little differently, the width/number of teeth on your blade will also make a difference! So be sure to have a chunk of wood handy to test on, as well as a ruler. Make a notch cut, measure, adjust the guide, make a cut, measure, adjust the guide repeat...You don't want to say "good enough" rip a whole pile of sheets and then later notice that you were off by a quarter inch (...ahem...). Remember, measure five times, cut once, and READ THE DIRECTIONS :)
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| So Happy Together! |
Chop/Miter Saw. This is not strictly necessary for this project because anything you need to cut can be done with your circular saw. However, I decided to use mine to make cross-cuts (across the grain of the wood, aka "the short way") in the planks so I didn't have to take the guide off the circular saw. It is also a good way to make a (close to) perfectly straight and/or 90 degree cut. The ends of planks are never completely straight, but shaving off the ends helps with this, at least a little. Mine is also laser guided, which is kind of cheating, but not really because it's just too friggin awesome. If it helps, why not? Also, it's just really fun and fast.
This is mine:
Sanders! Sanders, sanders SANDERS. Aside from the wood and nails, without which there would be no floor, this is probably the most important thing you will need. We happen to have three electric hand sanders. Two
Mikita Finishing Sanders that were inherited from my grandpa and uncle, and my
DeWalt Orbital Sander. I would not even attempt this project without an electric sander. We also had a bucket full of sand paper in different grits that have been collected over time so we were good to go on sandpaper, even though I of course bought another pack, just in case. More on sanding later.
Our Sanders:
Bostitch Air Compressor & Brad Nail Gun. COULD you perform this project without these things? Sure, but why the eff would you ever try?? This combo has been one of the best purchases I have made in months! Air compressors will always come in handy and let me tell you, nail gunning is MF'ing FUN! A few things to remember; Again, always read the instructions. Make sure you set the pressure appropriately. This tank will hold 150ib PSI in the tank, and shut itself off when that is reached, very nice. It will also refill on it's own when the pressure gets low. The first time you fill it will take a few minutes (approx 2?), and when it kicks back on due to low pressure, that takes a very short time, maybe 30 seconds. It's loud, but not unbearable. You will have to adjust the pressure (the bottom dial) based on what tool you are using. In this case, it should be set at about 110lb PSI for the brad nailer this unit came with. Just because it CAN go to 200lb, doesn't mean it SHOULD. As Keith explained to me, "...What do you want to do? Blow the nail right through the floor?" Good point. Also, be SURE to empty the tank when you are done with it for the day. It keeps condensation from building up in the tank and is basically just good tool stewardship. There is a little screw valve on the back of the tank. Just loosen this at the end of the day to let the air out. If you need to adjust the depth or change nail cartridges, or monkey with it at all, turn if off, for crying out loud, you don't want to be THAT A-hole...
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| Don't be a douche bag... |
My tank and nailer:
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| The Baller Brad Nail Gun. |
Ryobi Jig Saw. You could also get away with not having this for sure, BUT, it is pretty useful if you need to make a quick shave, a quick cut, or cut around something like an air vent (which I did, very handy). In my case, I kept it around because I did the majority of my cuts in the shop, and didn't want to bring all my bigger tools into the house. It would have just been too much, so I kept the jig saw around in case I needed to make a cut but didn't want to drag the board back out to the shop. This worked out pretty well! Jig saw blades are cheap, so you don't have to work too much about cost, at least on this particular tool. A personal note on this particular (brand of) tool I know I have mentioned being more of a DeWalt/Hitachi person, and I believe if you are going to splash out on something, you might as well buy the best you can afford, assuming these are things you are going to use for more than your current project (which I intend to). I bought a Ryobi jigsaw because I knew this was not a tool I was not going to use very often so I didn't want to buy a very expensive one. Ryobi is QUITE affordable, though sometimes the quality matches the price. That being said, this little guy has held up pretty good, though I have had to take the foot plate off to tighten it a number of times. I don't think the motor is the problem, it has so far been a pretty powerful little cutting tool, however, the fact that everything loosens up really fast and has to be readjusted is probably my biggest beef with it. On the other hand, I am not really using it for precision cuts, so whatever...By the way, check around for good pricing on these. I seem to remember only paying about 30.00 for mine, but link to Amazon shows it for significantly more. Like with all prices, it's a crap shoot, shop around!
My Jig-Saw:
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| The Jig-Saw on the work space |
Saw Horses. So necessary, so versatile. Obviously needed for cutting, but in a pinch, can be made into a pretty serviceable work station. I have already mentioned that I do not yet have an actual work bench. So, I made one, well, two actually. One in the shop, and one in the bathroom off the room I was working on. They can be easily moved, built, and then broken down again, so that was cool! I didn't have time to
build my own, so Penny purchased a bunch of
saw horse brackets and I just threw a few together using some scrap 2 X 4s I had laying around in the shop. Although I definitely should have included a cross beam to brace them, they were surprising sturdy and stable on the ground. Plus, cheap!
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| Saw Horses using Metal brackets |
For both the shop, and the bathroom work space I simply took a piece of scrap plywood or OSB (Oriented Strand Board aka: wood chip board, or "the itchy boards"), lay it across the sawhorses, trying to make sure they squared up nicely, and either screwed them in place (the shop) or nailed them in place (bathroom). Either way, you can easily take the board off later when you want your SHs back. In the shop, I also nailed some raised boards to the top plank with a space in the middle for the blade to go since this was going to be my cutting (and sanding) station.
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| Saw Horse work bench in the shop. #1 |
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| Saw Horse work bench in the shop. #2. Note two parallel boards with gap in the middle for using circ saw. #safetyfirst |
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| Saw Horse Work Space set up in Bathroom for materials and small cuts, etc. |
Paint, Stain, and Polyurithane. If you plan on staining your floors dark, you're going to want to paint your floors dark first. Especially if you first put white Kilz on it. Allison picked out the
Minwax Dark Walnut which was about 24.00 gal @ Menards. For a room this size, you very likely will NOT use more than half, of course, that might just be me. We also bought CHEAP paint and had it colored black. Since this paint is going UNDER your floors, no need to get fancy. You will also need a Polyurethane sealant to put on after your stain has dried.
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| Cheap paint, just add color. |
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| We used this stain. |
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| Poly Can. |
Safety First People!!. You may or may not need certain things to keep you safe and/or comfortable. You may want to consider the following:
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| Goggles and Face Masks |
Face masks. For dust and fumes. You can buy cheap ones for like a buck, and work up from there depending on how much protection you want. This will also come in handy when you start staining, which smells pretty intense. Personally, I mind the smell of my own recycled breath and the hospital-type smell of the mask more than I mind the smell of stain. I did not use it very much when sanding because fortunately I don't breath with my mouth hanging open. That being said, wear your mask you fools!
Eye protection. Mostly for saw dust! One of the world's many materials that make you say "Can you please not get that stuff in my face?". ;) Also, sawdust REALLY itches when it gets in your eyes, especially when you dont put the dust bag on your sander. You can get super cheap goggles, unfortunately they end up being uncomfortable. I'd invest in a slightly more expensive pair that fit more like sunglasses. Much more comfy, meaning you will actually WEAR them more. And by expensive I mean like, 7 bucks or so...
Hearing Protection. I suppose it depends on how much noise bothers you but whether it does or not, any ENT will tell you that these are a good idea. Amazon has plenty of Ear Goggle type headphones that cancel noise for any price point. I'd personally look for a pair that your ipod buds can fit under because I am here to tell you that sanding is boring as F. You might wanna find a
good podcast or some music because you're going to be at it a while. If you don't have ear muffs, you can use those foam ear inserts people use when sleeping in a pinch. Those are like a quarter at any drug store.
Gloves. I don't know, how fancy are your hands? I gave up after a while because my hands got so HOT, plus, I needed to be able to feel how smooth my wood was getting. (That's what she said...)
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| Just pick what works for you. |
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| "Mmmmmm....Beeer." |
Beer. Or, if you're a friend of
Bill W. Substitute this for Tab or Fresca or whatever it is non-beer drinkers drink.
Major note! I do NOT mean you should be operating any power tools while your buzz is on! This is a giant no-no, I mean, when you are FINISHED operating anything that can dismember you in any way, then you will want to crack open a cold one. If nothing sharp is around, feel free to get your drink on, it's thirsty work. I also buy 3.2 on purpose when I'm working on stuff, allowing me to drink when I want to, but not get all squiffy. No one wants to make a 6 in pencil mark and instead make something that looks like III IIII I II.
The Process:
Paint the Floor
The first thing I did was paint the floor of the room black. As Penny pointed out (and this point had totally slipped my mind), if you are laying floors and then staining them, the last thing you are going to want to see is any white showing through the cracks. Of course, if your floors are already wood colored or dark, lucky you, you get to skip this step. Notice that I have splotches on the walls. Normally I am very into taping but, since one of us is not only going to paint the walls, I am going to cut new base boards, I didn't really try to keep it as tidy as I normally would.
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| Floors painted black I |
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| Floors painted black II. Still quite wet. |
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| Floors painted black III |
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| Floors painted black IV. |
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| I did the floor of the bathroom while I was at it since I will also do this, eventually. |
Do the Cutting.
While the floors dried, I tackled ripping those 9 plywood sheets into 6 in wide planks. I will be honest with you, somewhere along the way, I must have knocked the Kreg guide hard enough to knock it off by a few little clicks. SO, I didn't actually rip 6 in planks, they were more like 6.2 in planks. That being admitted, they WERE a uniform 6.2 in! While I was pissed because I'm a weirdo about things like that, I didn't let it bother me too much. I wasn't framing a house, I was putting down boards on a floor. Oh well. But of course that bring us back to ALWAYS check your measurements!!
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| The Pile Begins |
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| The Pile Continues. |
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| Almost Done... |
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| Completed pile of planks! 4 layers. |
Do the Sanding
Great, now you have a bazillion planks that need sanding. This is where your clear glasses are going to come in. Basically what I did was use 100 grit sand paper and sanded the "better" side of any given plank. Start at one end, work to the other. Check your work for obvious splinters. I also beveled, meaning I rounded out, all the sharp angles by running my sander over them to make them a bit smoother. I pressed pretty hard, and changed the sand paper often. Don't forget to punch your holes in the paper if you have a sander with holes on the plate for venting. After the board was done as well as it could be, I started a new pile that contained the "finished" boards. There were also a few boards that had knot holes that really did require some filler, so I used
Elmer's wood filler and a metal filler paddle and really pressed it down into the worst of the knots. Then used to paddles to smooth it out pretty well. I threw these in the done pile as well so the filler would dry. I knew I would sand it out later. Once all the boards were sanded and laid out, I let them mellow out and settle for a while since the shop floor is REALLY flat.
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| The Pile of Sanded Planks |
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| Penny working the sander. |
Get your stuff set up.
So now that I've got all my sanded boards ready, I took a few of the saw horses and made a make shift work table in the bathroom (noted before). I just took some OSB scraps and nailed them across the horses so I had something to rest my: Glue and caulking gun (or in this case, glue gun), sanders, sand paper, brad nails, measuring tape, Speed square (measure measure measure), jig saw, little crow bar, hammer and beer on. I also had a Rubbermaid tub in the closet for garbage and scraps. The air compressor was out on the floor and had the nail gun attached. Pretty much good to go.
Find Your Middle. Aka "Snap Line Time".
The first strip is the hardest, but once you do that, it's basically like Legos, you just keep building on what you have already laid. Oh, and by "hard" I mean "nerve wracking". It's not actually physically difficult. I picked two of the straightest boards I could find and found the mid point on both ends of them with a measuring tape, then drew a line right through the middle of the board to connect the two mid-points with a straight edge. Now I know exactly where the middle is on these boards. Then I re-measured the room and found the mid-point of the room on both ends and nailed in a small nail on both ends to mark that point. Then, I used a snap line, wrapped it tight around the two nails, and gave it a good snap to make a mark right through the middle of the room. Don't forget to pull your snap-line nails out. After that it was just a matter of running a squiggle of adhesive down the middle of my board, laying the lines on my board on top of the line on the floor so they are right on top of each other and viola! First line of planks is laid. Shoot some brad nails into that board to make sure it's pinned down properly and pat yourself on the back. Have a beer.
A note on Patterns: I probably should have thought this out more. Not because my pattern ended up looking bad, it didn't, but because I wasted a lot of wood by not thinking best how to lay it to use it all with less waste. Basically what I did was use one board that was full length (about 8ft), and then chopped the rest that I needed to complete the row off the next board (about 5 ft). This left a 3 ft waste piece off of every other board I used. Fortunately, this will all get used when I do the bathroom or some other small space so I just piled them up and set them aside. Also, I alternated row by row so it was long-short, short-long, long-short, etc...
Nails. The brads are so tiny that they barely show unless you're looking for them so just do whatever works for you. In my case I used three on each end of the board I was laying to make sure the ends didn't rebel and then basically followed the nail pattern of the existing subfloor. That seemed to work pretty well.
This is how the first row turned out.
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| First Row. + 1 |
Keep Going.
Like I said, after the first row is laid, it is basically a matter of just repeating the process of gluing (a little goes long way, no need to over do it), laying the board, and nailing it in place. I have read a LOT about spacing, and how you should leave a little gap between boards to allow for expansion. After consulting with K, I decided not to do this since he told me that plywood is so stable, there is usually no need to do it. In fact, he basically said "Lay them as tight as you can.". (TWSS). Works for me, plus now I don't have to waste my time obsessing about the size of the gap between the boards. I used a hammer to tap the boards as flush as I could get them, both with each other, and with the wall. For the most part this worked out pretty well. I did have a few spots where I did a wonky cut or there was a curve in the board that caused a gap. I never really expected it was going to be perfect (though I did have my fingers crossed, hoping JUST MAYBE...), but on the whole, they basically all fit together the way I hoped they would. I did my cross cuts out in the shop so I lugged a lot of boards between laying rows and gave the new short boards a once over sanding in the bathroom on the ends where they had been cut. It's just a matter of repeating the whole process until you realize the floor is almost done. I DID have one air-vent I needed to plan around but it turned out to be pretty easy. I just cut out the general shape from the boards that would be around it, glued and nailed like usual, and then used the jig-saw to cut them so they (almost) perfectly matched the opening of the vent. Boom.
Laying the floor. (Bigger Pics Now, sometimes quality suffered).
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| Writer with floors so far. Overalls are very good for this type of thing. |
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| More rows, hole is where vent will be cut. |
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| Floor near wall. Oops. |
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| Looks better from this angle! |
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| Floors with the vent cut-out. |
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| View from the door. The pattern is more visible. |
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| View towards the east window. |
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| Glaring mistake #1 |
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| Glaring mistake #2 |
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| Orin checking out the new smells. |
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| Break Time. Big Time. |
Sanding, Part II.
I'm going to make this part short. It is also very boring. Your arms will be weak, your ass will hurt from scooting around on the floor, and your hands will feel really...fat, the next day (from all the vibration). Once the floors were all laid, I went over each row twice, once with 80 grit sandpaper (on one sander) to get off any roughness that may be remaining or developed from being re-cut or banged around, and a second time with 120 grit on a different sander. I could have done it with finer stuff but at this point, they really are pretty smooth, and I am trusting the poly coats to take care of any remaining snags. Also, a 4th total sanding? No way.
Staining.
I've never stained before, so I just sort of experimented on the first few rows. I started out using a rag and wiping it on and just working my way down the row. After about 3 rows I realized that this method was going to take some time unit just short of "forever", so I ditched the rag and busted out a brush. I brushed on the stain for 2 whole rows, slowly, to give the wood time to suck it up. Which it did, a LOT. Very thirsty boards. Then I would go back and wipe down the first row, stain the third row, wipe down the second, stain the fourth row, wipe down the third, etc. Basically, just alternating rows with staining and wiping. This routine seemed to work pretty well. The stain is very dark, when it is wet it almost looks like an ebony stain but it mellows out after a while to a nice cool color which I think will look amazing once the walls are painted and there is furniture.
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| Half done, still wet. I |
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| Half done, still wet. II |
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| Done. And with the overhead lights on. |
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| Close Up. |
This is basically where my work ended. The Poly coats are up to Alli and Penny since I had to come home to Minneapolis and sleep in my own bed for a while. Most recommendations are between two and four coats. I am guessing two should do the trick. Once the Poly is done, wait three days before you move any furniture on top of the floors. Even though you only have to wait about 6 hours between applying coats, three days is usually advised to let it fully set up so it can start taking a beating. I will update this post once they have done this, as well as how the room looks when furniture is in it, though since we still have to do the bathroom, that may be a while.
Cheers!,
Meg
