Angled Walls - Page Four


Racking & Keeping The Floor Aligned

We have two separate pages on this subject with links also seen near the bottomUsing wedges on angled walls of the page. However a few items not discussed are tricks to keep a floor straight while nailing against angled walls. Our illustration shows an area being installed left to right with the bottom being the left side. Loose boards are the racked out area.

When nearing these areas and stapling very near the end of each piece cut on an angle, we have no support between the board and the drywall or base. The straight alignment wants to run off because of this. Inserting small temporary wedges in these areas (discussed on previous page) will provide the support needed and the layout will not bend.

Wedges do not have to be used at every board end. This phenomenon (yikes that's a big word for an installer) occurs not only with fastened hardwood floors, but glue downs and floating ones as well.

Finishing Off The Final Rows Against the Wall

There comes a point when the stapler will not fit near walls and we resort to the finish nailer again. If you've kept some longer straight boards for this area you'll see

how much easier it is to finish off the area opposed to using random boards that are not straight. Through the larger open areas it becomes much easier to get a tight fitting floor because there's leverage in tapping them into place with the rubber side of the mallet. Pneumatic staplers also exert a good amount of force keeping those boards together too.

For stubborn boards there are several options. One can either do it by hand with a long handled screwdriver, or invest in a tool called the power jack, shown on our tools pages. When nailing the final courses do so by blind nailing or nailing into the groove at a 45 degree angle. At one point it will be necessary to top nail the last few rows.

Go To: Hardwood Runs Into Other Rooms. How To - staying straight
Back To: Installing Hardwood With Fasteners - Introduction

Other Pages In This Series:

• Starting The Hardwood Installation - nailing the first few rows, expansion
• Installing Hardwood Against Angled Walls
• Hardwood Runs Into Other Rooms. How To - staying straight
• Change Direction Of Hardwood Floor - reversing

Related Pages:

• Racking Hardwood Floors
• Keeping Floors Aligned. Meeting Around Walls
• Solid Hardwood Floors - different types
• Hardwood Floor Nailer - staplers too
• Expansion Gaps and Hardwood Floors
• Hardwood Flooring Humidity