Parquet Floor - Repair Ideas?

[malcolm]

I'm about to start work on the snug. It has a parquet floor laid in 1910, but has been carpeted for years and about 5m2 has been removed due to rot (exterior ground levels since sorted out).

The size of the pieces are 285mm x 70mm x 30mm and I suspect the wood is oak. I'm having a devil of a time trying to find reclaimed parquet in that size. Anyone have idea where to find some?

 

[plasticpigeon]

It looks like pine to me!! Perhaps pitch pine? I'm afraid I dont know where to buy it from. An idea might be to buy some old beams and cut them to size or get them cut if somewhere will do it (often woodyards won't cut old wood as the probability of nails damaging equipment is quite high).

 

[malcolm]

Thanks for that - it is light weight and the grain is straight so it could well be a slow grown pine. I hadn't thought about having some cut.

Another possibility might be to buy enough parquet for the whole floor and just replace it.

 

[Cubist]

I agree with Plasticpigeon, its Pine and your best option may be to get them cut to size. That said, I'm surprised you cannot find something similar from the reclamation yards Parquet blocks of that size and material were pretty common in many public buildings and I would have thought there would be acres of the stuff around.

A couple of thoughts though.

If you can find blocks of the same length and width but thinner, you could use a marine plywood base to lift them to the same height as the rest of the floor.

If you end up going down the route of having them cut size make sure they timber is thoroughly dry before it is cut - the blocks will shrink. Same applies if you decided to use new, rather than reclaimed, but there will be more shrinkage.

 

[livias]

Is it difficult to lift? I would be concerned that incoming bits will not be a good enough match. Can you lift the middle pieces and reuse them at the edge. Then infill with incoming timber which then gets covered by a rug?

 

[plasticpigeon]

I suppose it is all personal preference, but I think it would be much better to patch in than remove quality flooring unnecessarily. It should be possible to stain new wood to get it to blend in with old.

 

[Me!]

A 70mm depth cut is within the capabilities of most modern cheap bandsaws, which cost as little as £150 these days. Obviously it is not a top quality machine for that price, but would probably be fine to cut up some bits of reclaimed pine into the correct sizes for your floor. Or buy a secondhand one of better quality, which you could then sell again when you've finished with it. Do not buy a cheap blade for any bandsaw though. The difference in bandsaw blade quality has to be seen to be believed! I use blades from Tuffsaws, and I'm very happy with them.

 

[88v8]

I guess you've tried here
https://parquet-parquet.co.uk/

It is indeed an odd size. Perhaps foreign.

Here's some pitch pine. 12" x 2.75" x 1.125". Not even close.
https://parquet-parquet.co.uk/products-page/reclaimed-parquet/pitch-pine-reclaimed-parquet-2/

And I presume it's tg, so not only the size but the groove height would need to match.

I suspect you'll end up getting some made.

Never knew parquet was made from so many different woods - hadn't even heard of some of these.
https://parquet-parquet.co.uk/products-page/reclaimed-parquet/
And it's cheap, although perhaps that reflects the hassle of cleaning it.

I bought sacks and sacks of oak reclaim from the Lloyds (Insurance) 1921 building when it was demolished in the 70s, but at the time the bitumen defeated me, never did get around to using it.

As to lifting it, hot bitumen that looks like, would be possible to lift and nowadays one can glue it straight back without much cleaning, so that might be an option.

Ivor

 

[malcolm]

Thanks for the replies - I feel more confident about the flooring now. Mine isn't tongue and groove so I might get away with ordering some reclaimed parquet of the correct width and height then cutting the pieces to length. I'll order a sample from the parquet-parquet place and see how it fits.

 

[Easrow]

We have just bought 22mtr of Parquet from eBay. It took a while for the right size to come along but there is always some around. You might need to travel for it but there will be some around.

 

[Toby Newell]

Hi

I do this for a living.

Your blocks are pitch pine with a certainty of 100%.

There are a couple of standard widths and 2.75 in (70mm) is one of them and about a thousand different lengths.

Beware of cutting old beams as they have internal stresses that are relieved after being cut, also I haven't seen too many pitch pine beams in my travels, mostly oak, elm and other pines, but I suppose there must be some pitch pine beams somewhere.

I would simply look for reclaimed parquet blocks, you may need to search for a few months. Obviously as someone else said, you need at least 70mm x 285mm and you can cut bigger blocks down on a 'site' / 'rip' / 'table' saw, don't worry about the depth, you can pack these out with shims, wood etc. Plywood is probably your best bet.

Your floor is very high quality by the way, the grain pattern is especially fine for pitch pine and the blocks are very thick, you won't find many 30mm thick pitch pine blocks of that quality anywhere, quite rare, so however long it takes to source replacements it will be worth it. Floors such as yours are far rarer than oak parquet.

When you come to finish it get back in touch as you need to be aware of resin beading on the surface and attacking the finish (although it does smell wonderful) oh and please wear a dust mask when scraping the bitumen from the floor / loose blocks / reclaimed blocks, asbestos fibres were often used to give bituminous adhesives extra strength and although that means the fibres are bound to a sticky / solid matrix, you don't really want to be breathing in vast amounts, just incase.

The man at parquet parquet (if he is still the same man I spoke to years ago) will tell you you don't need to remove the bitumen, well, so will some manufacturers. I aways remove all bitumen as it's either sticky and therefore moves (and thus contains more volatiles which attack adhesives) or hard and very brittle, which cracks under repeated load (fatigue) or shock load. You could use F Ball F21 cold dip rubber adhesive which is compatible, but this is very messy and doesn't totally negate the problems, I just remove as much as possible and use a high performance silane based adhesive (I use Wakol MS260 or Bona R850 but there are many more on the market now) and as far as I am aware I have never had a loose block. I'm sure leaving the bitumen in place is probably ok many times, but I prefer to work to a higher level than probably ok!

T

 

[malcolm]

Thanks Toby. That's useful info. I think I've made the decision to save the parquet. The parquet was laid by Edwardians who extended and elevated the house and also added a new facade with nice stonework. I think they had some budget!

 

[malcolm]

I got lucky and found some parquet of exactly the right thickness and width locally. It had been removed from a house in London and is in much better condition than mine and the grain matches perfectly. There is 5m2 which is enough to replace up to a quarter of my floor which should be more than enough. The finish colour is about the same too - what would the finish be? The plastering is close to completion so I ought to start thinking about the floor.

On top of all the 20th century abuse I realise mine was laid badly in the first place - it butts right up to the plinth brickwork and the edges are rotten. I'll leave a gap and cover it with skirting but it means roughly half of the parquet will end up being lifted. I'm wondering whether to lift the other half as well as some of the gaps are over 2mm wide, and it would give me the chance to smooth out the base a little to make it easier to re-lay. On the other hand it takes me 2 hours per 1m2 to remove bitumen from the blocks and I have 20m2 in the floor.

 

[plasticpigeon]

Nice find. I don't know what the finish was. Toby will know! I would not make your life and harder than it needs to be and lift as little as is needed!!!

 

[malcolm]

Good point plasticpigeon. Maybe I should do the half that needs doing and then see how enthusiastic I still am. It's nice to keep some part of it old and original. I've ordered the adhesive and trowels and will hopefully make a start next week. I've contacted a local floor sander as I gather that part of things can be easy to mess up.

I've found Toby's website and bookmarked it this time!

 

[malcolm]

A few of the blocks I cleaned up had been reset with modern adhesive which I found impossible to remove. Those blocks are now in a spares pile in case I really need them. I'm going at the floor now!

It feels selfish not to think about the next poor soul in 100 years time faced with half a floor of blocks with modern adhesive on the back. Anyone found any easily removable adhesive?