Laying Wide Plank Oak Flooring
20th Nov 2015
When laying wide plank oak flooring, there are points that should be considered which are not applicable when laying narrow oak flooring.
How you fit the boards comes down to the subfloor you are laying onto. This is an important step as this can determine what type of oak flooring is most suitable for you.
For areas with a timber subfloor, or when laying over joists/battens solid or engineered oak flooring can be used.
For narrow solid oak flooring boards (140mm or less), the secret screwing or secret nailing method is used. This method involves driving a nail or screw through the tongue of the boards at a 45 degree angle. These should be fitted on every joist, or every 350-400mm.
For wider plank solid oak flooring (160mm or wider) simply secret screwing in this situation is not enough. In addition, the surface fixing method should be used. Surface fixing can be done in two ways. One method is to drive a screw through the surface of the board at regular intervals. This screw is then covered with an oak plug to hide away the fixing.
An alternative method is to use a floor brad. These can be seen as more decorative than the plug method.
For the surface fixing method these again should be fitted on every joist or every 350mm-400mm. With boards wider than 200mm, more than one fixing will be required.
To refrain from the surface fixing method for wider boards, engineered oak flooring can be used. As engineered oak boards provide added stability, they do not require the additional fixing.
In other areas you may need to lay over a concrete subfloor. For this you have two options; the floating method or the glueing method.
The floating method should only be used with engineered oak flooring, you should never float a solid oak floor. This method involves running a bead of glue along the tongue of each board. This means that there is no direct fixing to the subfloor, hence the “floating floor”.
Alternatively the glueing method is used. This method involves using a flexible floor adhesive for direct adhesion to the subfloor. When laying wider oak flooring, only engineered oak flooring should be used. Again this is because of the added stability that engineered oak flooring brings. Only narrow solid oak boards of 120mm or less can be glued.
If you would like any further information on fitting wide oak flooring boards, please give us a call on 01538 304584.
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