Floor advice required

[JohnMBrebner]

I'm going to renovate an old pine floor ie sand & varnish the boards etc. but there are gaps between the boards. I don't want to lift and relay the boards so I plan to fill the gaps (various 3-5mm) I was thinking of wedge shaped pine strips glued in and levelled off but I've heard rumours of cord or rope being inserted into gaps. Has anyone had experience of either of these techniques or any other suggestions? I know this isn't exactly cutting edge woodwork but any info would be gratefully received

[Stuart]

I relayed my living room floorboards to decrease the gaps but I also had to fill in some gaps that were left because of broken tongues . What I did was cut strips off a spare board and tapered the pieces and tapped them in to the gaps with glue and then planed off the excess. It worked wll and looks excellent as the pieces were from the same matching source. Stuart

[space]

I've heard it recommended to use rope or papier mache (sp) which can then be stained with the floor boards. Personally I did neither and just put the gaps down to natural characteristics of the wood.

Space

[Mary Fisher]

That's what we did too. Whta's the problem with gaps?

Mary

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[Stuart]

Depends whether or not they are gaps casued by shrinkage of the boards where the tongues and grooves are still complete . If the gaps go right through then that causes dust etc to come up from below . Stuart

[Mary Fisher]

Gravity will ensure that dust will also go down :-)

Mary

[The Natural Philosopher]

Then cover the lot with hardboard.

[Jerry Built]

You can fill wide gaps with fillets above (glue one side only). Papier mache is best for smaller cracks (made with wallpaper paste).

J.B.