Newbie, making a bunch of flooring

[Phil Landwer]

Take a close look at the edges of a commercial t&g floor board. This is not a glue joint, there is more geometry going on there. You want to take a full jointing cut on the edges when you make floor boards, one side typically has a slight back bevel below the wear layer and a slight reveal below the tongue slot. This leaves very little bearing surface on the boards edge. With a TS it's a tricky set up, you need to have very straight lumber very precisely milled and take off a precise amount on each side, gravity will not be in your favor. You need good in/out feed support. With a shaper it is easy to edge and precisely dimension in two operations. This is why I recommend you have the whole job planed, sorted, straigh lined, and organized before you tie up your TS with the molder head. Can you do the reliefs on the wood master? Well worth a set of knives iMo.

Good idea.
ill either use the wood master or that Fox Shop 1812 for the back cuts.

[Brodie Brickey]

This stuff is going to have to be jointed and surfaced on day 1 and stickered. Re-surfaced on day 2 to final dimensions or things will move.

Do you have enough space in your facility for two stacks (1st day's work, 2nd day's finished dimension)?

[Phil Landwer]

This stuff is going to have to be jointed and surfaced on day 1 and stickered. Re-surfaced on day 2 to final dimensions or things will move.

Do you have enough space in your facility for two stacks (1st day's work, 2nd day's finished dimension)?

Ok, will do....
If I dead-stack outside on my driveway, off the ground, and cover all well with plastic, will I be ok if it rained one day?

[Peter Kelly]

How many square feet of flooring? You'll want to factor in an extra 10-15% of material for waste. Also, I'd make sure that you've got some spare sets of flooring profile knives for the Magic Moulder. LRH has been out of business for a while now...

[Phil Landwer]

How many square feet of flooring? You'll want to factor in an extra 10-15% of material for waste. Also, I'd make sure that you've got some spare sets of flooring profile knives for the Magic Moulder. LRH has been out of business for a while now...

All I can cut.
i have access to several sets of those plugs.
Thanks, Peter.

[John TenEyck]

Router? Why use a router, when I have the Magic Moulder with a stock feeder?
My planer has a helical head. Do I really need to sand this stock, before delivering? I thought the installer will sand it, once installed, before applying a finish.

Why a router? Because the stock will be flat on the table and easy to present to the cutters, just like with the shaper. On your TS the stock will be on edge which makes it a lot harder to support. I think you would also fiind setup to be easier on either the shaper or router compared to a TS. However you decide to do the T&G truly flat stock of constant thickness and no crook is the key to success.

If the installer is going to sand it after installation then you don't need to do anything after the planer. But I don't think this is common practice with a new floor, so I recommend you find out what the installers expectations are for the material. If his expectation is product ready to finish then you will have to figure out how to add that process to the list of machining operations. A drum sander would be the weapon of choice.

John

[Scott T Smith]

Ok, will do....
If I dead-stack outside on my driveway, off the ground, and cover all well with plastic, will I be ok if it rained one day?

Phil, that would not be a good idea. The wood will pick up moisture from the relative humidity, and then shrink after it is installed - leaving gaps between the boards.

Personally, for flooring I would joint and plane on the same day, and do the best that I could to remove the same amount of material from both sides of the board. it will be sanded after installation, so any minor movement will be addressed then.

[Greg Portland]

How much flooring are you trying to produce? That will greatly affect any method of work or equipment recommendations.

The Magic Moulder does a very good job; I'm not sure you're going to see major improvements with a shaper (given the small size of the edge profile). IMO, a power feeder for your table saw + jig & magic moulder head is going to get you most of that "shaper goodness". If you're doing 10,000+ sq.ft. like in the other thread then follow the suggestions outlined there...

[Phil Landwer]

How much flooring are you trying to produce? That will greatly affect any method of work or equipment recommendations.

The Magic Moulder does a very good job; I'm not sure you're going to see major improvements with a shaper (given the small size of the edge profile). IMO, a power feeder for your table saw + jig & magic moulder head is going to get you most of that "shaper goodness". If you're doing 10,000+ sq.ft. like in the other thread then follow the suggestions outlined there...

Im thinking the same thing, Greg.
make me a tall fence, and I'm set with my Grizzly power feeder.
i can use my dial gauge to make sure I raise the MM the same height each time.

[Peter Quinn]

If you have an 1812 molder that is the clear choice for reliefs. I've done them on one and it works well.

[Phil Landwer]

If you have an 1812 molder that is the clear choice for reliefs. I've done them on one and it works well.

But, not for putting the boards on edge, to do the T&G ?

[Phil Landwer]

If you have an 1812 molder that is the clear choice for reliefs. I've done them on one and it works well.

And, at which step should I cut the back reliefs?

[Jeff Duncan]

What may be the biggest advantage of the shaper, (or even a router table), is you can easily set up so your taking off the profile plus a little....say 1/32". This is important so that you have a perfect and clean edge for your boards. Running over the tablesaw doesn't allow you to do this easily and may not give quite as clean a cut?

The second advantage is that you can do a finish profile and size the stock simultaneously. This makes your work cleaner and much faster.

Also as another poster mentioned make sure you have flooring tongue and groove cutters and not the glue joint style. If you use the wrong cutters your client is not going to be a happy camper

I think you can do this job on a table saw, though it is an awkward setup that is going to require a lot of additional steps and time to setup. That being said you have to use what you have, and since your not trying to support yourself with it.....go for it

good luck,
JeffD

[Peter Quinn]

I'd do the reliefs last, after running the tongues. But I suppose you could do them whenever you like if you set up for it. The knives should be made so you land on a solid piece of stock, not a 1/2 relief, at each edge. A hussey clone lets you get up to 7" flooring, might as well make the knives the maximum length if you are doing 6". I suppose you could do flooring standing up on the 1812 with proper stock support but any bow or twist would cause it to bind up. You only have the top of the tongue as a bearing surface for the feed wheels, the flooring would quickly wear a groove in those standing on edge.

[bill tindall]

There is no way that you will make flooring to the precision that it needs to be made with your equipment, to say nothing about how slow it will be relative to someone making flooring with a molding machine. If you want to convert your lumber, presuming it is KD to the proper specifications, take it to a shop with a molding machine where it can be converted cheaply, precisely and quickly.

Should you proceed in spite of the above advice have an experienced floor installer try some of your product before you convert too many bdft to this project.