parquet / block flooring

[StevieB]

OK, so SWMBO was desperate for this in our hall and dining room, and a deal too good to miss on e-bay came up so an impulse purchase was made - I am now the owner of approx 50m2 of Teak (as it was advertised, although I think it is Iroko) block flooring. Usual situation of being lifted from a sports hall with bitumen on the underside. We couldn't afford new for that kind of area, and I got this lot for approx £7 per square meter, so if this doesn't work it can go back on the bay and I might even end up in profit!

Cleaning the bitumen, which is hard and dusty, - main method seems to be to scrape. Two alternatives I had were to either bandsaw a mm or so off the bottom, although if the blade wanders then the base will then not be flat, and the groove is close to the base of the block. My preferred method would be to lay the blocks face down on a flat surface (piece of MDF) hem them in with a couple of thin support strips to stop them moving sideways, and then run them through the thicknesser say 12 blocks at a time. Flip them over, drop the blades a touch and clean up the top side. Although this may blunt the knives, it is worth a couple of sets in the time it will save - has anyone ever run blocks though a thicknesser in this way and did it work?! Will not be laying the actual floors for quite a while (probably not this year in fact!) but would like to clean the blocks sooner rather than later so I can store and sort them in advance.

Cheers,

Steve

 

[hanser]

Hi Steve

Might work with the P/T. Hope your dust control is up to scratch as the bitument dust is very fine and gets everywhere. I've been there and scraped off 5 m2 for an ensuite. Back of a chisel jobbie. Just did batches of twenty or so blocks an evening.

Horrible job but well worth the effort. Just a shame SWMBO wanted a fully tiled ensuite some 15 years later :shock:

 

[Racers]

You can get glue that will stick to the bitumen so you don't need to scrape it off.

Pete

 

[StevieB]

Thanks Hanser - tell me about it - just moving the blocks made me black yesterday. I will be doing it at the bottom of the garden I suspect but dust mask still a pre-requisite.

Pete - possibly! My googling suggests a range of options from 'no glue sticks to bitumen, scrape it off' to some glues do if its not sticky (sika 5500s is mostly recommended). However, much of the bitumen is lumpy/uneven so still needs scraping (albeit perhaps not back to bare wood). If I have a thicknesser however, it makes sense to take the drudgery out of the job - with approx 3000 blocks it is not going to be quick!

Steve

 

[Racers]

I think you would need a new thicknesser after cleaning that lot up, with all the bitumen cement dust stones bits of s@*t flying about.
A scraper just to get the thickest lumpiest bits off then a floor sander to level them once they are down, the Sika stuff does work.

Pete

 

[mickthetree]

I am laying some similar in my house at the moment. approx 100m2. I'm using lecol 5500 adhesive (get a good breathing mask). Dont bother scraping off, just the edges with an old chisel on larger lumps.

Lecol 7500 filler is AMAZING stuff.

Finish in Osmo 3032. Even got in in our bathroom. Did a load of experiments and it is so water resistant.

Will post some pics when I get chance.

 

[StevieB]

Thanks Mick. Big area! How much of an expansion gap are you leaving round the edge? It will not be possible to lift my skirting so will need to cover any gap with a moulding, I am trying to decide how big I need to make it!

Steve

 

[a4mative]

Hi,
I've nearly completed mine, about 30 m2. I found best / quickest way was to make up a jig an run them from my tablesaw however they were in pretty bad shape. I set it just shy of removing any wood. I also found the groove a pain to clean do so used an old biscuit join bit in the router table worked a treat.
After doing lots of research I settled for rewmar ms polymer. It's certainly not cheap however seems to work excellently and has bonded to the parquet really well.

 

[manxman]

I had the same idea a few years ago, in the end I did enough to do one small room, used lecol products as above, hand scraped and buggered up a thicknesses in the process. Although I was happy with the results see here, ( hello-all-t29921.html ) I would never entertain doing it again, the amount of work involved, the dirt, mess, time etc it just isn't worth it imho. Brand new parquet isn't that expensive as to make it worth the hassle.

That's my experience anyway!

 

[StevieB]

Thanks chaps - plenty of food for thought there. I will attempt a couple of methods and see what works best for the blocks I have.

Steve

 

[MrYorke]

Gotta be either bandsaw or table saw the bottom slightly and then re-groove the base.

Table saw method would be better if you're worried about blade wondering on b/saw.

I'd stay clear of putting it through your thicknesser to take bitumen off as I'd say it'll wreck it. And also the pieces are probably too short anyway

Good luck and let us all know how you go.

 

[n0legs]

I've got a choice of 2 methods here depending how you're equipped.
Hot air gun and a paint scrapper then give them a real good sanding to remove the remaining tar.
Or what we used to do -
Get a piece of ply and around the edge fix a low level "fence" on 2 adjacent sides. Place as many blocks as you can fit onto the board face down then clamp them in with 2 more pieces of "fence". I had a floor sander but you could use a belt sander with a very coarse grit belt, and sand off the tar/adhesive. This way is very quick and would leave a great surface for the new adhesive when relaying them.
If anyone suggests you use paraffin, petrol, white spirit or any other solvent well to be honest ignore it. The blocks swell and some split.The blocks end up stained and it's a hell of a mess and quite unsafe.
The sanding method can be a bit of a mess but it will all sweep up and you should be wearing a mask anyway. Do it on a cold day and definitely not in the sun.

Some adhesives will put up with the bitumen but I've always thought they are better laid clean.
Sika was always my choice for adhesives.

 

[StevieB]

Thanks nolegs. I really don't want to go down the hot air paint stripper route - doing paint is bad enough but hot tar is going to be a real pipper to scrape! I like the belt sander idea, might give that a go....

Steve

 

[hansonread]

Is there a reason why we don't still use Tar to stick them down? Might sound like a stupid question but if they used to use the stuff to lay huge areas then what is stopping you from doing it again?

 

[StevieB]

'Elf and Safety mate - just because of a few carcinogens in liquid bitumen..... spoilsports!

 

[LeeElms]

Apparently the bitumen sometimes contained asbestos. (This was highlighted when we had an asbestos report on our church building a couple of years ago).

 

[scholar]

I don't have personal experience of this, but a former colleague did a large part of his home renovation with reclaimed parquet.

I recall that he found it best to chip off the bitumen when it was cold - I don't think I am imagining this, but I recall that he stored them in batches in the freezer to facilitate this. Apparently it worked great.

If I was chipping off this stuff, I would use my Bosch GSE300E scraper - an excellent machine (I have used it for cleaning mortar off countless bricks), but now discontinued I think - here are the only pictures I could readily find (from a Polish website) http://archiwumallegro.pl/bosch_skrobak ... 87200.html . There is a lighter DIY version the PSE180, which might be worth a try.

Anyway, looking fwd to the WIP pics...

Cheers

 

[Phil Pascoe]

I don't fancy trying to chip off bitumen with a banana.