Hey, I'm in Ohio -- maybe I can borrow that nailer from your friend!TomHoffman wrote:Your bit set should come with roller guide bearing on the top, this will allow you to automatically cut to the correct depth as set by the guide bearing so the bit will either leave a slight gap or not, most likely there will be a small gap that will then look uniform and give the boards a tiny bit of room to move. Harbor Freight has a good Floor Nailer for slightly more than it cost to rent. I had one until I lent it to a friend and now he moved to Ohio. Oh'well...BuckeyeDennis wrote:This discussion motivated me to do a little research. For my secret-room project, I'm paneling the walls in cherry, and doing the floors in red oak. Most of the boards will be about 6" wide, and I plan to tongue-and-groove them all. My T&G router bit set will cut both the tongues and grooves a maximum of 7/16" deep, but I didn't know how deep I actually needed to cut them, or how much spacing to leave between boards when installing.
It turns out that Nick Engler has a nice tutorial on this, on his Workshop Companion site.
Actually, I plan to countersink, screw, and plug the floor boards with walnut plugs, just because I like that look. And I'm planning to face-nail the cherry paneling with square-cut nails, for an old-timey look.
This is the Freud T&G bit set that I bought for my paneling project. I measured the max depth of cut at 7/16" for both the tongue and the groove, which is what you get if you guide on the bearings. But I'll be running the lumber against the fence of a router table, and so I can cut to whatever depth I want.
- T&G bits.JPG (21.3 KiB) Viewed 2399 times
Unfortunately, while loading the cherry on my trailer, I discovered an active powder-post beetle infestation. So I bought the recommended wood treatment to stop that once and for all. But now I'm having to wait for above-freezing weather so I can treat it.
But enough about my project -- this thread is supposed to be about yours!
