I have a question.Can I use pallets for flooring.

Aug 01, 2012, 08:21 PM

After I remove the nails and sand down the wood.I wanted to see if pallets can be used for flooring.Like a hard wood floor.I want to lay the wood in my house and then stain it.

Aug 01, 2012, 10:38 PM

Jaybee

Pallet material is the crappiest of all. It's beat up, rough-cut and split. Yes, it is possible to cull pallet pieces to get the best of the crap. It's possible to plane it down smooth. It's possible to mill a tongue and groove into it so you do not have exposed nails.

If you are serving 25 to life in a prison cell and you have some pallets (and nothing else to do), then this could make sense. Otherwise - no. The only way you will get a halfway decent floor is with a lot of time and some luck in your pallet supply. Otherwise, you will still spend a lot of time and wind up with a horrible floor.

I am biased though. We recently were a part of a project where the focus was to re-use pallets. We made a door, a bed headboard and a table - all from pallet material. The homeowners loved it. The designer loved it. The crew loved it. Those of us who understand construction knew it was crap - it looked like crap, had rough splintery surfaces and was going to continue to crack over time. But many are swayed by current trends: Pallets are "in" right now.

Aug 02, 2012, 08:42 PM

nona

sure, you can do anything you want. It's your house and your pallets. A side benefit of doing it is that you will be the hit of the neighborhood for having the junkiest floor ever. You might even get on a TV show for doing the dumbest thing ever

Aug 03, 2012, 11:08 PM

Brande

@ nona!!!You no I was just wondering if it could be done.There was no reason for you to be so rude.Please DON'T reply to anymore of my questions.This is for people to ask any question they have and not for people like you to make them feel stupid!!!!!

Aug 03, 2012, 11:10 PM

Brande

Thank you for the info.

quote:
Originally posted by Jaybee:
Pallet material is the crappiest of all. It's beat up, rough-cut and split. Yes, it is possible to cull pallet pieces to get the best of the crap. It's possible to plane it down smooth. It's possible to mill a tongue and groove into it so you do not have exposed nails.

If you are serving 25 to life in a prison cell and you have some pallets (and nothing else to do), then this could make sense. Otherwise - no. The only way you will get a halfway decent floor is with a lot of time and some luck in your pallet supply. Otherwise, you will still spend a lot of time and wind up with a horrible floor.

I am biased though. We recently were a part of a project where the focus was to re-use pallets. We made a door, a bed headboard and a table - all from pallet material. The homeowners loved it. The designer loved it. The crew loved it. Those of us who understand construction knew it was crap - it looked like crap, had rough splintery surfaces and was going to continue to crack over time. But many are swayed by current trends: Pallets are "in" right now.

Aug 04, 2012, 01:36 PM

nona

I appologize, Brande, I didn't intend to insult your intellegence, but was only trying to make a point. Again , I appologize

Aug 05, 2012, 08:11 PM

Jaybee

I actually felt that nona and I were saying the same thing - we just have a different sense of humor and verbage.

Aug 08, 2012, 10:54 AM

GardenSprite

As a former collector (read "scavenger") of free wood of various kinds and saver of wood from walnut trees and evergreens, I agree that working with pallets isn't worth the effort. The wood is too rough, too scratchy (offering the unwelcome opportunity for too many splinters, or requiring you to work with cumbersome gloves), and will never provide a professional appearance.

I did use pallets for storage of things in the basement to keep stuff off the floors, but only temporarily. Over the years I haven't found them to be worth saving.

Sidebar: we did score big time last week though. A neighbor was adding a garage and using what my father said was #1 grade lumber, and threw out all the leftover wood. So guess who backed up the station wagon and collected the scraps for our woodworking projects?)