Elm for flooring

[Swing_blade_Andy]

Guys

I have a customer who seems to be keen to use Elm for the flooring in his restoration of his XVII century Estate home. It's worth a bundle to me and so I want to get it right first time. Has anyone out there had any experience using Elm on the floor. My experiences with elm I have cut to date is that it has warped and twisted merrily, merrily even though it is quite dry. This would be nothing short of a nightmare if it occurred in this case.

Hence I plan to:
1.quarter saw all boards;
2. Dry under significant compression load to 10%
3. Recommend a glued fix rather than a nailed fix. This will create a raft rather than fix each board to the joist;
4. Oil finish to allow the timber to breath and provide expansion space under skirting
5. Wait till the slab is dry to 2 % before laying insualtion and top screed followed by timber floor
6.pray (quite a departure for me).

Any other suggestions.

Andrew Henderson
Ireland

[Tom]

It sounds as if you have it pretty well covered, Andy.

When laying wide board Yellow pine, my customers who have had the best luck have first put down a substantial subfloor and then laid the pine floor in glue on it.  It would be affixed by surface nailing the pine floor, many times with brads or finish nails, and then it would be sanded and finished.

The floor boards should spend a time in the environment in which they are to live.  Just drying to a certain percentage is only half of the battle. Either stack them in the room where they will be installed or stack them in a room like it.  They really should acclimatize for at least a week.

[Sawyerfortyish]

I sawed some elm (once)  ;D
 Pray Andy pray
 You could always give it the I can't see it from my house guarantee : ;D