Fixing SW t&g flooring

[TimW]

This is my shed, a smart, habitable shed but still a shed. Having secured my 2x1 battens to the concrete floor I am going to lay sw/whitewood unfinished ex 6x1 t&g boards to make a permanent floor. I don't want to screw the boards down, too ugly and too much work to plug screw holes so it will be nails, and I am wondering:

Non secret nailing, ovals? in pairs? Secret nails in the tongue? in the groove? Pre- drilled? Secret screwing even? Hire a floor nailing device? Air gun nailing?

I have a compressor and a nail gun but the nails it uses seem spindly for this kind of work. Now I think about it I am wondering if a drill bit with a countersink and Number 6 screws angled through the tongue might just make a really good and easy job of it. But I have been wrong before.

Tim W

[Andrew]

I just used spax 45 mm screws diagonally through the tongue of my Wickes 'solid hardwood' flooring, but I predrilled every hole with one of those devices that drills and countersinks at the same time to avoid splitting the tongue.

[Andy Burns]

tongue-tite or lost-tite screws, I used them into oak rather than softwood

[tabbypurr]

any of those work. no need for pairs. You're only stopping it moving horizontally, the nails take no weight, and they're already constrained by their neighbours.

likely to cause a fit problem

If you want, but I get the impression you're overthinking it. I wouldn't contemplate hiring.

NT

[John Rumm]

Yup, that's what I used on engineered ok boards. I pre-drilled to save splitting any. Quite quick since you don't need that many per board.

[Andrew]

I started using those but managed to snap a couple so I reverted to conventional spax wood screws, predrilled and countersunk.

The tongue-tite screws are very slender so if a lot of expansion and contraction is likely over the course of a year, or many, will they fail ?.

[TimW]

I didn't know 'flooring screws' existed, so thanks, yes have used these. Working well on the whole. A couple of splits on where screwing near the board ends.

TW

[Andrew]

They are just countersunk screws made by Spax for any job. Box says 3.5 * 50 Barcode number 4 003530 006760, but having a normal countersunk head, you need to predrill and countersink the hole. Takes more time but DIY time is free !

[Andrew]

For your 1 inch battens, Wickes do 40mm ones for half the price

[charles]

If you have a second drill to hold the countersink bit, you save a lot of time. DIY time on one job takes time off some other project.

[Andrew]

I have a selection of drill bits that have a counsink collar that clamps onto a special flat section of the bit. Drill and countersink in one go.