How to Install Nail-Down Hardwood Flooring
- 1). Top-nail the first course of flooring, whether you install this along a wall or in the center of the room. Do this by drilling pairs of holes in the flooring at 12- to 18-inch intervals and driving in 2-inch finish nails with a hammer. Make sure to nail within an inch of the grooved end of the flooring boards. Snip off the end of one of the finishing nails to make a bit for drilling the pilot holes. Sink the heads of the nails with a nail punch.
- 2). Top-nail with a nail gun by simply holding the head of the gun on the wood and pulling the trigger. Adjust the compressor air pressure so that the head sinks about 1/8 inch into the wood.
- 3). Install the next course of flooring by tapping the grooves of the boards into the tongues of the first course. Stagger the short ends of the boards by at least 6 inches from the short ends of the boards in the first course.
- 4). Toenail the second course through the tongue at 12- to 18-inch intervals. Use a nail gun, or do it by hand with a hammer, drilling pilot holes and sinking the heads with a nail punch. Don't use a flooring nailer if you are in the center of the room, as the force needed to drive the cleat may move the first course out of place. If you are near the wall, you won't have room for the nailer.
- 5). Use a flooring nailer to toenail from the third course onward if there is room for it. Set the lip of the nailer against the edge of a board along the tongue, holding it in place with the handle. Hit the spring-loaded driver sharply with the rubber side of the mallet to force the cleat through the tongue. Hit with enough force so that the head of the cleat sinks into the wood. Continue to toenail with a nail gun, if that is the nailing method you are using.
- 6). Install the entire floor in this way until you get close to the wall and run out of room for either the nailer or the nail gun. Toenail by hand until you finish the second-to-last course.
- 7). Measure the gap between the wall and the second-to-last course. Rip the board of the last course to fit, using a table saw and preserving the groove side of the boards. Set the depth of the table saw blade to 1/2 inch and remove the bottom part of the groove from these boards. Drop the boards into place along the wall and top-nail them.
