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Home > Bob on TV > Home Again > Elmwood Neighborhood > Kitchen Project Begins > Reclaimed Pine Floor
Elmwood Neighborhood
Reclaimed Pine Floor
Behind the Scenes - Elmwood Neighborhood
The Drivers selected reclaimed heart pine from Mountain Lumber for their new kitchen floor. The lumber was longleaf heart pine—a select grade—reclaimed from the Avery Dennison Paper Mill in Framingham, Massachusetts. Random widths were specified to optimize the yield of lumber and minimize waste. Mountain Lumber brought in nationally recognized flooring consultant Howard Brickman to oversee the installation of the reclaimed pine floors.
Since the wall with the existing dining room was removed and the kitchen area is L-shaped, the flooring was run in both directions to take advantage of the two axises and make a more functional transition from the old floor and the new Mountain Lumber heart pine. The subfloor elevation differences were carefully adjusted then the new floor was installed. After the moisture content of the subfloor was checked, 15# asphalt saturated felt was placed prior to the new flooring. The flooring was then blind nailed with a Powernailer. Plenty of nails were used and where the flooring changes direction the ends were re-grooved with the EZ Groove bit to lock the ends together and prevent any movement.
Mountain Lumber's most sought-after and versatile grade of Heart Pine provides a durable, beautiful, and moderately-priced classic floor. Select Prime complements old-fashioned to contemporary furnishings in homes from any era.
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Aged wood has an incomparable warmth, stability and patina giving a new home an sense of permanence and place. With its rich amber color, its tight grain, its structural stability, and historical significance, reclaimed wood renders immense value to a residence or a commercial structure.
Since the early seventies, Willie Drake, the founder and president of Mountain Lumber, has been a leader in finding buildings containing outstanding Heart Pine and saving the historic wood from demolition. Mr. Drake and his scouts hand-select the finest of this wood and ship it to Mountain Lumber's mill in Virginia where it is resawn, kiln-dried, milled, and graded based on standards originally established by the Southern Pine Inspection Bureau in 1923.
When their scouts find piers with pilings that were made from longleaf pine timbers, Mountain Lumber will often dismantles the old piers for the timbers. The pilings are carefully lifted straight out of the mud and water and transported to Mountain Lumber's saw mills for remilling.
Back at the mill, painstaking care is taken in the removal of all nails, bolts and debris embedded in the timbers. This process is done by hand, checked with a metal detector and checked again until the wood is entirely clean.
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Unlike newer mills that saw beams with multiple blades, Mountain Lumber controls the quality of their boards by turning the beam to produce the most rift grain possible. When the finished flooring comes off the molder, all sub-standard materials are removed so that only 100% usable wood is shipped out to the customers.
After the timbers have been sawn into "blanks" they are "sticked" and prepared for the kiln. Drying the lumber to achieve the optimal moisture content ensures that the wood will behave well during installation and last for years to come.
Finally, the wood is carefully packed by lengths in 5-board bundles, wrapped and banded. This protects the product in transit and simplifies unloading when it arrives at the jobsite.
Over the last 25 years, Mountain Lumber has reclaimed over 20 million board feet of pine and other woods, saving them from oblivion in landfills.
The heart pine forests in the 1600s covered millions of acres. These trees were extremely tall, wide, densely grained, and plentiful. During the Industrial Revolution, heavy logging of heart pine began. Strong, straight and immense, the tree could yield huge beams and decking to support large machinery.
Unfortunately, demand outpaced supply. By the 1930s, the dense forests that greeted the explorers were gone. Today, surviving virgin longleaf pine covers far less than 1% of the original forests.
However, this old-growth heart pine can still be found in large quantities today in the "reclamation forest" - older industrial areas slated for demolition, neglected rural buildings and unused piers.
Copyright BobVila.com © 2001
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