How to install boards to finish ceiling?
Architect is going for sauna/spa vibes with this one. Calls for 1″x6″ boards to run along the ceiling. Picture attached for reference.
Here’s the homedepot link to the board
How would you guys achieve this look? [76D89A2405594AEF953C48436CB68D43](//muut.com/u/brownstoner/s1/:brownstoner:stPM:76d89a2405594aef953c48436cb68d43.jpg.jpg)
Jimmy
in General Discussion 3 years and 1 month ago
32
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32 replies
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 1 month ago
anyone contemplating doing what i have described above must understand, on the drywall, unless they know they have wood joists up above and are running across the joists and mark those joists and get a 2.5″ 16 gauge finishing nail into each joist on each piece of wood, they MUST use that adhesive on every other piece of wood. toe nailing alone on drywall will not be enough as over time the finish nails will loosen and i am afraid continued expansion and contraction might not really stop or might pull at the nails and it 15 years it is a mess.
any homeowner planning to do this on their own in even a smaller room would be wise to consider getting a pneumatic nail gun. porter cable sometimes sells a 3 gun kit with a compressor. using a nail gun on something like this would make it move so much faster and once you have a nail gun in the house you will be willing to try other things.
steve and doors by are the same person
stevecym | 3 years and 1 month ago
I just checked. The construction adhesives i mention above are actually designed to allow wood to expand and contract.
In so far as allowing for expansion and contraction. It is not a game of chance. An experienced person doing this knows they must allow for it. The issues green mentions, buckling, those are the sorts of things that occur when inexperienced people do this sort of work. If done right by the right people there will be no issues.
stevecym | 3 years and 1 month ago
Hmmm, i’ve put this up just the way i said about twenty years ago the way i described, toe nailed with contruction adhesive on every other one and never had a complaint.
The problem a lot of newbies have when they deal with wood is not understanding the issues that expansion and contraction can cause. So they would still have to be hung the way i said in my earlier reply – not too tight, especially if this is going up in the winter because we know it will expand. Or perhaps a little tighter in the summer with smaller gaps around the edges because we know it will contract. I explained that in my reply above, how much play to leave. The other thing some one can do is take a mousture meter to the wood and see what its potential for movement is: it will expand more across the grain, less over the length. There is data out there explaining what different species of wood will do as moisture content changes. Pine happens to move a lot.
A lot of people hang crown and other trim to drywall now by applying some construction adhesive and toe nailing the wood. The toe nailing is very strong in wood and somewhat strong in drywall but is only really done to secure the wood until the adhesive dries. Unfortunately today, few people know what toe nailing is and fewer use it (i use it but had to look the name up).
To your point about the adhesive inhibiting expansion and contraction, i would not run the adhesive the length of the board buy would put a half dollar size blob of it, 3/8″ high, every 15 inches or so. This will still allow movement. Also, if there is any uneveness in the drywall, pressing on the thick pl400 adhesive more or less will force the glue to spread more or less as needed, taking up any gaps created.
One other thing. Construction adhesives are not glue. Some of them are harder and some softer. The pl200 and 400 appear softer than the premium when set. There is also panel adhesive but i am less familiar with it. These adhesives allow more movement than the glues or epoxies we use.
This can only be done on new or flat drywall. Not plaster. The furring goes on plaster. Plaster has issues and can be unpredictable.
Construction adhesive has changed a lot about how we do things in the past 40 years and most adhesives are stronger than the products we are joining. And don’t be afraid it will pull tha paper off the rock. This pine is light and we have had instances where it was very difficult to break that bond.
GreenThinker | 3 years and 1 month ago
For arguments sake, the drywall could be attached to metal studs instead of wood joists; therefore you’d want wood furring to attach the boards too. Furring also allows you to do what ever spacing you’d like between nails. The furring may also allow for a bit more expansion/shrinkage movement, lessening the chance of gaps or buckling with the boards.
stevecym | 3 years and 1 month ago
Nyc sport: why is the furring needed over a new flat cieling?
nyc_sport | 3 years and 1 month ago
Mount furring strips to the ceiling, and blind nail in the tounge and grooves just like one would do installing hardwood flooring
stevecym | 3 years and 1 month ago
The kind of nailing i am trying to describe is “toe nailing”.
stevecym | 3 years and 1 month ago
If that is real flat, you can skip the grid and put them right to the rock with pl 400 on every other board and use that double nail pattern by placing the nails 1/4″ apart and shooting them sort of in opposite directions. They cant pull out and if you mark your joists and hit one of them a couple times on every board you will be fine.
stevecym | 3 years and 1 month ago
And i should not have used the term grid. Grid implies fur in both directions. You need them in one direction, across the joists. Lay your tg across those.
Jimmy | 3 years and 1 month ago
thank you both for the help, I assure you guys that this is very helpful. The ceiling has just been drywalled so the boards are supposed to cover the drywall
andriywww1990 | 3 years and 1 month ago
do the grid like green mentions and use long deck screws to attach it to the ceiling joists. if the ceiling is uneven, run a line across it in say 3 or more places depending on the size of the room to find your low spots. mark them and mark the high spots. attach the pieces of the grid at the low spots first (low meaning hanging down toward the floor) and then shim the higher spots and attach so the grid is level. sort of like anything else we put on a floor, work the high spot first (in this case low) and build to it.
here is the thing on this, you will not be nailing this in like you do flooring (very tight). it is dry right now. the wood might be dry when it goes in and you will not have either twist shank nails or cleats holding it (and even if you did, the pine might move and pull off the nails or cleats), so i would not pound the wood in against one another, like you might do on an oak floor. leave a little bit of wiggle along the sides of each board (not a lot, not a full 1/16″, just a little wiggle for expansion) and leave 1/8″ around the perimet er on a smaller room and 3/16″ on a larger room. if you do not leave space for expansion, this wood could swell in the summer months and begin to pull and loosen the wire brads – even 16 gauge. you can also use pl400 or premium on very third or fourth board. sometimes when i do stuff like this, i shoot the nails in pairs at opposing angles away from each other and together they offer more hold. and do not count on them having a/c on all the time. something could happen, a leak from above or the a/c is down for some reason, the house is empty, and there is a problem.
i hope this is going on over a finished ceiling because this stuff will burn fast if there is a fire and it offers no protection.
GreenThinker | 3 years and 1 month ago
Same way it’s installed on a floor, nail into the tongue, groove covers it up, where the board starts and finishes, you nail into the face of the board in the corner, and it’s covered up by either trim or the board that goes on the wall. Normally people use furring strips spaced every foot or so, or you could just plywood the whole ceiling and then attach the boards.