I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George

"George Miles" wrote in message
...
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

I would strongly suggest making the screws so they *are* unscrewable, and
not gluing the boards to the rafters. If you remove some of the screws, you
can paint that area and then replace them and repeat the process on other
areas.

On 21/08/2020 18:13, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George


You may be as suprised as I was to find that screwfix sell specific
floorboard screws. They don't need pre drilling, don't force the board
off the joist (but tighten it down) and have tiny self countersinking
heads. - Marvelous!

TW

On Fri, 21 Aug 2020 18:51:10 +0100, TimW wrote:

On 21/08/2020 18:13, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George


You may be as suprised as I was to find that screwfix sell specific
floorboard screws. They don't need pre drilling, don't force the board
off the joist (but tighten it down) and have tiny self countersinking
heads. - Marvelous!

Do all wood screws not behave in that way with soft woods?

"TimW" wrote in message
...
On 21/08/2020 18:13, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George


You may be as suprised as I was to find that screwfix sell specific
floorboard screws. They don't need pre drilling, don't force the board off
the joist (but tighten it down) and have tiny self countersinking heads. -
Marvelous!

The main thing is that you want to be able to lift the boards (either long
narrow ones or large rectangles of MDF) in case you need access underneath.

We had a vile smell of rotting meat upstairs and narrowed it down to
somewhere in the loft. I searched in between the boxes and cases on the
floorboards, and shone a torch into the eaves. Nothing. So I shone the torch
up the gap between the boards and the rafters - luckily the boards finished
away from the eaves. And there was a dead rat up one of them.

So I cleared everything off the MDF boards above the rat and unscrewed all
the relevant screws, The boards didn't budge *at all* - not even allowing
for the fact that they *might* have been tongue-and-grooved together. I
think the idiots who laid that floor in the loft had glued the boards to the
rafters, and just used the screws for extra belt-and-braces - or for
decoration!

Luckily I was able to lie on a board with a margarine container gaffer-taped
to a garden cane, and hook the corpse closer to the unboarded part, and then
pull it out with my hand inside a bag - not nice, but I wrapped it up
quickly in several bags which I sealed before putting the package in the
bin.

But if the rat had died further under, or between a couple of the
cross-beams at right angles to the rafters, we'd have been utterly stuffed.
I'm sure the smell would have got worse before it got better. At least I
could see where it was and could see when my "hook" device was in the right
position.

So I'd say that you should always plan for lifting the boards, even if they
are normally firmly screwed down to stop them creaking when someone walks
over them when they are in the loft.

On 21/08/2020 18:30:01, NY wrote:
"George Miles" wrote in message
...
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

I would strongly suggest making the screws so they *are* unscrewable,
and not gluing the boards to the rafters. If you remove some of the
screws, you can paint that area and then replace them and repeat the
process on other areas.

Or just fill the heads with something like Blu Tack before painting.

On 21/08/2020 18:13, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George

is it old inch and eighth T&G flooring?

On 21/08/2020 18:13, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George


If you cut any of the floorboards (even in the centre of a joist) make
sure there is a substantial extra noggin spanning the join. I would use
screws


--
mailto : news {at} admac {dot} myzen {dot} co {dot} uk

On Friday, 21 August 2020 18:14:02 UTC+1, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George

Nails: quick, easy, superquick supereasy with a nailgun. But creaking can occur & occasionally lifting.
Screws: no creaks, but slower & large heads.

Paint doesn't prevent unscrewing.


NT

On 21/08/2020 20:58, wrote:

Nails: quick, easy, superquick supereasy with a nailgun. But creaking can occur & occasionally lifting.

In the good ol' days they would use cut nails that had a substantial
taper and with a fairly large head - something a nail gun doesn't fire!


--
mailto : news {at} admac {dot} myzen {dot} co {dot} uk

In article ,
alan_m wrote:
On 21/08/2020 20:58, wrote:

Nails: quick, easy, superquick supereasy with a nailgun. But creaking can occur & occasionally lifting.

In the good ol' days they would use cut nails that had a substantial
taper and with a fairly large head - something a nail gun doesn't fire!

And the board would often split when lifting them years on. And the nail
shear off when attempting to remove it.

Screws are the way. Use a second drill to make a pilot hole and a power
screwdriver. If you want to be able to remove them at a later date. Not
something that bothers the average tradesman.

--
*Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Yes, it seems to me that drilling a pilot hole in the floorboard means normal screws will pull the board down without the hassle and expense of the fancy double threaded floorboard screws

(they are not tongue and grooved)

George

On Saturday, August 22, 2020 at 11:19:04 AM UTC+1, Dave Plowman (News) wrote:
In article ,
alan_m wrote:
On 21/08/2020 20:58, wrote:

Nails: quick, easy, superquick supereasy with a nailgun. But creaking can occur & occasionally lifting.

In the good ol' days they would use cut nails that had a substantial
taper and with a fairly large head - something a nail gun doesn't fire!
And the board would often split when lifting them years on. And the nail
shear off when attempting to remove it.

Screws are the way. Use a second drill to make a pilot hole and a power
screwdriver. If you want to be able to remove them at a later date. Not
something that bothers the average tradesman.

--
*Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Sat, 22 Aug 2020 10:49:36 +0100, alan_m
wrote:

On 21/08/2020 20:58, wrote:

Nails: quick, easy, superquick supereasy with a nailgun. But creaking can occur & occasionally lifting.

In the good ol' days they would use cut nails that had a substantial
taper and with a fairly large head - something a nail gun doesn't fire!

The nails holding the floorboards down here (1890's cottage) are the
'bright cut' type?

Luckily, Dad had a proper slide-hammer nail extractor tool (that I
wouldn't have know existed if he hadn't had one) and that got most of
them out without too much hassle. All removed now replaced with
screws.

Cheers, T i m

In article ,
T i m wrote:
Luckily, Dad had a proper slide-hammer nail extractor tool (that I
wouldn't have know existed if he hadn't had one) and that got most of
them out without too much hassle.

They do quite a bit of damage to the board, though.

All removed now replaced with screws.

The larger head hopefully covering up the damage. ;-)

--
*Just give me chocolate and nobody gets hurt

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Re-boarding our kitchen floor and will be using screws, screw-tite 2s. They may be double the price of ordinary but worth it for the time saving of not having to drill pilot holes. Currently the boards are nailed down with 2 1/4€� lost head nails which are a sod to jemmy out often wrecking the T&G. Had these nails in a previous property which had chipboard floors simply used a parallel punch to knock them them into the joist the boards lifted easily without damage. Doing the same in softwood the heads move about producing large holes or splits.

Richard

On Sat, 22 Aug 2020 11:51:04 +0100, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:

In article ,
T i m wrote:
Luckily, Dad had a proper slide-hammer nail extractor tool (that I
wouldn't have know existed if he hadn't had one) and that got most of
them out without too much hassle.

They do quite a bit of damage to the board, though.

They do ... to the top, dents either side of the nail head etc, but
that's it, no splitting of the boards when forcing them up from the
side with a bolster etc.

All removed now replaced with screws.

The larger head hopefully covering up the damage. ;-)

It does, mostly but even if it doesn't, I cant see an issue or think
of a better solution that didn't cause any worse damage?

Cheers, T i m

Screwfix have 3 different kinds of screwhead
Wirox
PZ2
TX T-star

Which will be easiest to remove if it gets coated with paint and shoe grunge?

https://www.screwfix.com/c/screws-na...rews/cat840052

[george]

On Saturday, August 22, 2020 at 1:22:13 PM UTC+1, T i m wrote:
On Sat, 22 Aug 2020 11:51:04 +0100, "Dave Plowman (News)"
wrote:

In article ,
T i m wrote:
Luckily, Dad had a proper slide-hammer nail extractor tool (that I
wouldn't have know existed if he hadn't had one) and that got most of
them out without too much hassle.

They do quite a bit of damage to the board, though.
They do ... to the top, dents either side of the nail head etc, but
that's it, no splitting of the boards when forcing them up from the
side with a bolster etc.

All removed now replaced with screws.

The larger head hopefully covering up the damage. ;-)
It does, mostly but even if it doesn't, I cant see an issue or think
of a better solution that didn't cause any worse damage?

Cheers, T i m

On 21/08/2020 19:11, Scott wrote:
On Fri, 21 Aug 2020 18:51:10 +0100, TimW wrote:

On 21/08/2020 18:13, George Miles wrote:
I'm replacing floorboards having rewired underneath
- nail or screw ?
what are the pluses and minuses of each?

Plan to paint it, so would that make the screws unscrewable?

PZ2 or another kind of head?

advice and experiences please

George


You may be as suprised as I was to find that screwfix sell specific
floorboard screws. They don't need pre drilling, don't force the board
off the joist (but tighten it down) and have tiny self countersinking
heads. - Marvelous!

Do all wood screws not behave in that way with soft woods?


Not really. These are made for self drilling with a different pitch of
thread at the top of the screw, so as they are tightened the board is
brought down onto the joist. And heads so small they won't break the
tongue off a t and g board if you are doing it that way, and so small
they look like nail holes if you are coming through from the top.

Good stuff!

TW

On 24/08/2020 15:21, George Miles wrote:
Screwfix have 3 different kinds of screwhead
Wirox
PZ2
TX T-star

Which will be easiest to remove if it gets coated with paint and shoe grunge?

https://www.screwfix.com/c/screws-na...rews/cat840052


Possibly it also depends on how you drive the screws in. With an
electric impact driver it's quick but quite easy to round off a PZ2 head
when screwing back into harder wood (perhaps older dried out joists).
This can make the screws difficult to remove immediately after just
fixing let alone later when the heads are full of gunge.


--
mailto : news {at} admac {dot} myzen {dot} co {dot} uk

On 25/08/2020 08:42, alan_m wrote:
On 24/08/2020 15:21, George Miles wrote:
Screwfix have 3 different kinds of screwhead
Wirox
PZ2
TX T-star

Which will be easiest to remove if it gets coated with paint and shoe
grunge?

https://www.screwfix.com/c/screws-na...rews/cat840052


Possibly it also depends on how you drive the screws in. With an
electric impact driver it's quick but quite easy to round off a PZ2 head
when screwing back into harder wood (perhaps older dried out joists).
This can make the screws difficult to remove immediately after just
fixing let alone later when the heads are full of gunge.


I reckon impact drivers are less likely to damage screws even if they
bounce out. And, having done that they will usually continue to drive in
or out as required if you lean on them a bit harder.