parquet flooring

[CJ]

I am about to demolish and rebuild a delapidated Victorian conservatory. When rebuilt, it will be about 40 square feet bigger than it is now. The original flooring is wood block parquet (blocks are about 28 cm long, 7 cm wide and 5 cm deep, laid into bitumen in an off-set square pattern). I'm having trouble locating someone who can lay the reclaimed blocks and match up for the new, bigger area. I'm in South Glos. Any ideas? :?

 

[Penners]

How about doing it yourself? The following links might help:

http://www.diynot.com/pages/fs/fs016.php

http://www.screwfix.com/talk/thread.jspa?forumID=22&threadID=321&messageID=1545

 

[Big Dave]

Hi C J

The size of blocks you mention sound thicker than anything I've ever come across, however the method of installation is typical. In order to carryout any repairs or additional flooring you need to use an adhesive by Balls called F21, this is a modern equivelent, as the origional would have been laid using hot bitumen, similar to whats used by professional roofing contractors.

The problems you are likely to experience with extending a floor of this type is that the existing blocks have aclimatised over 100 years, and if you should be lucky enough to source some identical blocks, they will have acclimatised to a different humidity and moisture content, when you then come to interlock them to the existing floor if they are slightly smaller or larger than the existing you will find that the floor will either have gaps that get progressively larger as you work towards the border or you just cant get the blocks to go together. If the new blocks are larger and you re-machine them to match, if the moisture content is higher than the existing and they shrink gaps will again appear. Depending on the finish used you may get sidebonding which causes lightning strike type gaps of upto 5mm or more.

I used to be a proffessional hardwood flooring contractor and would always run a mile from reclaimed block as it was frought with problems which I couldn't guarentee against.

My advise would be to lift the existing keeping them inside and sell them on to someone through some classifide ads, and use the money to buy some new materials enough to do the whole room, possibly of a simmilar size and have a new uniform floor finish, which you can always take pride in and have the confidence its not going to move excessively.
The blocks you describe sound about 2" thick, I dont know any one who produces blocks that thick these days but given the finished floor height you could overlay the floor with WBP plywood srewed every 4" to the subfloor and then lay the new timber by secret nailing to the ply, alot less mess and cost and easier for a diyer.

Possible suppliers would be Havwoods in Preston or Atkinson Kirby in Ormskirk Lancashire.

 

[CJ]

Thanks, Big Dave. Was coming to this conclusion myself and your comments have helped me to clarify things. This flooring has been dried out and bleached due to being in a sunny conservatory for 100 years whereas the rest of the ground floor is under cooler, darker conditions. Plus, I don't think I'm going to find the block thickness I need. Think I need to go for a complementary flooring of some kind but still in wood I think.

 

[Toby Newell]

Well I think that would be a crying shame. 50 mm thick Victorian parquet is highly likely to be good quality wood, you will NOT get anything like as good looking or even durable wood these days. I would keep the floor, repair it and get a local carpenter/timber merchants to mill you the new blocks and pay someone to sand and match them in. The wood is so thick you can sand and get a near perfect finish but with a good patination of colour. You probably wont find such blocks in salvage yards as over 1 inch thick blocks are very rare and VERY expensive.

It would be a real shame if you installed a boring engineered floor finished in UV coated melamime plastic from quick grown unsustainable wood.

Regards

Toby Newell

 

[chuckey]

As your blocks are twice as thick as the modern ones why not investigate having them all sawn down through their thickness, this would give you twice the number. They would all have the same moisture content as well. You would have to look for some one with a THIN bandsaw. Make good the difference in floor level with 22MM P5 boarding with oil temperd hard board, nailed at 6" centres on top (buy a nail gun).
Frank

 

[ljhilditch]

Our house has the original parquet flooring throughout the downstairs, ours turned out to be pine about 30mm. We had our professionally sanded and stained and they look amazing! Just to give you an idea of cost, Approx 800sq ft cost around 2000 GBP. Here are a few pics.
http://hilditch-house.blogspot.com/

 

[CJ]

Thanks to all who replied on Monday 17th. Don't worry, Toby, I won't do anything hideous - I meant complementary (wood from same period and similar quality albeit maybe a different design - boards perhaps) not contemporary. Your idea of trying to get blocks made is one I'll look into as is Chuckey's of getting mine sawn through. ljhilditch - your floors look fab and thanks for giving me an idea of cost.