Hey Yall,

I found this ipe at a bargain barn a couple miles from my house. It is mostly 6-8 ft lengths, 7/8" thick and no end match. I talked the owner down from 3 a foot to 1.5 but I have to buy the lot. 2200 ft. I pay 3.89 for ipe from my distributors.

It is really nice looking stuff, and i put ten boards together that clicked right together. The moisture with my mini ligno ranged from 8-12 percent from board to board. About 700 feet of it is 10-12 footers. The wood is thicker from the tounge to the top of the board is thicker than usual as well, probably 5/8ths on the top and 1/4 on the bottom.

This wood is for my personal house, HAve you guys heard of a mill like this? Should I be concerned with this strange mill?

What do you guys think?

Could it be exterior decking? Ipe is commonly used around here for exterior decks. But I haven't seen it T&G for decking before. It sounds like a bargain. You will need to either glue it down as well as nailing or mill T&G's on the butts OR use a biscuit joiner. If you're willing to take the extra effort to ensure a successful install, it sounds like a super good deal.

Thanks Gary,
I already bought it, so I am glad to sense your nod of approval.
I am cutting every board into 3 foot pieces for a sort of oversized herringbone, then cutting the boarder and installing quartersawn red on the outside.
Do you think that I will need to route the ends for that?
I wasn't planning on it?

My buddy is taking 850 of it off me to put in his house, I told him that he shouldnt need to route each end since he is going over 1/2 inch ply. But I mentioned that to be sure to keep the ends from moving he ought to?

I talked to another one of my distributors today from Kelly Goodwyn, he agreed that it is probably decking, and that as long as the majority of the boards are straight that it is steal.

What type of glue were you thinking? Thanks

End matching helps to keep the butts even. If you are herringboning your install, you will need to rout grooves to engage the tongues unless you are mitering the butts. Any urethane adhesive will work as long as no water's in it so no acrylic urethanes. Chemrex, Bostik's, DriTack, Franklin are all good. How wide are these planks/boards?

The material is 3".

I was thinking that I would only have to route one end on every board equally alternating sides during installation and routing half left and half right ends for preparation.

Is that right? Do you think it will be strong enough without routing tongues into the other ends?

In herringbone installations that employ a "log cabin" or square end butt type of corner, I guess you could get away with just routing the one end. If I were doing this, I'd set up a workshop where I first would production cut all the boards to length. Then I'd set up a router table or shaper with a slot cutting bit and cut end butt grooves in all the boards. Now, they are all ready to install.

thats what ill do
keep posted for pictures

This might help you out Jab .... then again it might not

http://picasaweb.google.com/jwt253/Herr ... KxGAyy4QJs

UHHHH that was freakin awesome. The only thing I was going to do different was not use plywood backups. That is a good Idea.

Check out the picture board for a picture of the wood I got..

That’s beautiful work Jerry and thanks for sharing the details.

After cutting the boards on the miter saw and making the field cuts to receive the border, did you also have to make a micro bevel where those cuts were made?

Thanks guys.
You talking about that dining room photo Jamal? If so, that ought to be real nice.

Buddy, that floor was a square edged 4-sides , Bruce Fulton Strip

Jerry,
I saw where you said the flooring is square edge but in photo #22 it looks like the edges are slightly beveled or eased so I was thinking the cut edges would look a little different than the factory edge and would have to be slightly beveled or rounded. I am glad to here that is not necessary.

They say its square edged Buddy, but it does have an ever so slight edge treatment. Photo 26 shows a factory edge next to a cut and I did not need to do anything special there.