yup, love that tool also. with it I can tounge and groove everything.

How do you hold the part? Freehanding a small plank sounds scary!

I put the board on the floor and go at it, for ripped pieces I set them on the table saw. I even use it on installed peices in the floor

I'm not real familiar with the Bosch "Colt". How easy is it to change the cutting height? All my routed grooves are done in a two step process, one with the bit in a "high" position, another with the bit in a "low" position. My Jessen lift mechanism makes this easy, but the Colt...

it has a quick release for hieght adjustment, Its a metal clasp similar to how a belt buckle works(?) I pull the clasp, move it up or down, and close the clasp. It stays locked in that position unless I move it. It also has a dail for fine adjustments up and down.

Why are you needing to adjust the height of the cutter when grooving the ends? Typically, a groove is 1/4" x 1/4" . A 1/4" carbide rabbeting bit should be able to handle the grooving process in one cut.

My Tigerwood has a tenon thickness of 0.275"-0.285" so I need to raise my 1/4" rabbeting bit by ~1/32" after each initial pass. I have no idea as to the manufacturer of this material as the boxes have no information as to their source other than "Product of Canada". Of course, I didn't realize this until I brought home all the maple and Tigerwood and had them in the house for a month or so. Of course, my seller who was "remodeling" is now gone and the warehouse is vacant. Still, the Tigerwood appears to be of very good quality with very few bad boards. I've lost >10% of the rustic maple due to problems with the finish rather than any problem with the wood. With all that said, it still turned out to be a good deal as the wood was <$2/sqft.

That explains it. Many Canadian products use different milling specs and standards. I've experienced this before. American made spline doesn't fit, feature strips don't fit, etc. Even different mills in Canada use different T&G profiles. They do that in the states as well. BTW, typically, most flooring that is truly "Made in Canada" is of at least good quality and usually very good.

A little more advice needed...

I'm reaching the end of my hallway and need to discuss strategies in competing the layout. I currently have one strip of Tigerwood border set aside to finish each side of the hallway for butting up against my final wall. They are both uncut for length. I plan on putting one strip of Tigerwood widthwise across the hall at the end, slipping it slightly under my undercut molding. All the center field of my hall is maple set at a 45 degree angle to the border.

My dilemma is the order by which I plan to finish.

1) If I nail the border down first, then I run into a problem when I try to place my last half dozen rows of boards since I cannot get the lower tongue under the tenon of the borders. I'd have to cut the lower tongues off all the maple and allow the end to hang "free" with no constraint to move up. One fix to this would be to put the small corner in first, then work to longer boards until I hit the field, but that will necessarily cause a misfit with the last board. Another potential fix would be to glue down the ends of all the boards to the border and/or floor.

2) If I nail down the side borders only and plan to put in the last width-wise Tigerwood board last, then I can nail the field down as usual, taking care to match the free (open) length. But then I can't get in the last Tigerwood board and slide it slightly under the moulding since there is no clearance.

3) Same as #2 but put the tiger wood board under the molding first and then, at the end, try to wiggle it back into the hall and force a good fit against the field. Problem here is that there is no way to grip the board.

4) Tear off the molding, finish the field, reinstall the molding, repaint the wall. Problem here is that I don't think I'll get the 3' molding off without destroying it. And I have no more leftover paint so I'll need to custom match the color and purchase another gallon. Ugh!

I've given this a lot more thought and this is my plan:

1) Nail down the tigerwood border fully along both sides and against the wall.
2) Complete the field as usual until I hit the first corner, then finish the "triangle" gap using three pieces per strip so I can fit both ends then trim to fit the middle piece. All pieces will be nailed as usual.
3) When I can no longer fit three pieces, then I'll need to cut off the lower section of the female end and glue this edge to the tigerwood.
4) The last piece will be a custom fit small triangular piece glued directly to the floor. That piece will take some time to mill/plane/sand to fit!

"Tools of the Trade"

Here's my router table, where I routed 325+ boards in a two step pass. A small table would have worked well in 95% of all cases, the only exceptions being the milling of very long boards.



This saw is overkill for this job as a $99 Sears crapsman would have worked just fine. But this is all I have, and again, it's in the basement.



But this saw does give near table saw quality cuts in a much safer package.



The job is complete! I'll post pics of the finished hall within a couple days. It turned out great!

OK, the floor looks great but the carpet looks like hell. I purchased a cheap carpet kicker on Ebay and need a general technique to pull the carpet up against the hardwood flooring. I've already nailed down a fresh tack strip and just need to know the process of how and when to cut the carpet. This will only be used on two 3' doorways. The carpet that borders my long length of hallway will be replaced in the Spring.

Thanks again for all the help!

Nail your tackstrip leaving a gap, the thickness of the carpet, called the gully, as a place to tuck the carpet into. It is easier to stretch with about an inch or two of excess length of carpet to work with.

Place the kicker on the carpet, about an inch or two back off the top of the tack strip. With all your weight on your arm like doing a push up, and holding that weight on the kicker head so it doesn't slip, bang the kicker pad with your knee. Use your other hand to immeditately press on the pins. If I absolutely have to kick, I give it two bangs on the kicker. One kinda stretches it up and the second stretches a little more, then sets it on the tackstrip pins.

Now trim the excess, leaving it a tad long, like 1/4". Tuck that into the gully. A putty knife will work to tuck with. As your tucking use your other hand to keep the carpet pressed on the tackstrip pins

Thanks for the quick reply! What tool do you use to cut the carpet?

A razor knife.






You can use a utility knife.