How wide can I go in heart pine and heart cypress?

Flooring is available in widths up to 10," with a 9" face after the tongue and groove is applied. Heart pine logs may be two to five hundred years old but are often no more than 24 inches in diameter. It can take up to 30 years for a heart pine tree to put on just one inch of girth. Heart pine lumber is available up to 12 inches with occasional slabs up to 18 inches. Heart Cypress is much larger and Goodwin has recovered logs up to 1,700 years old. Heart cypress slabs are available up to 42."

Is heart pine hard enough for wood flooring? What about heart cypress?

Heart pine is almost as hard as red oak (1225 vs. 1290 on the floor hardness scale) and is 29 percent more stable than Oak according to the NWFA. George Washington's floor in Mt. Vernon is over 250 years old and is still walked on every day. Heart cypress is a softer wood, comparable in hardness to Douglas fir, however many clients rave about it as flooring.

Do you need to end match heart pine?

The average length of a heart pine floorboard is 7-8 feet and we cut them 2-4" longer than marked. Floorboards in oak generally average 2-4 feet in length and require endmatching for added support when spanning floor joists. Remember that end-matching equipment may require the manufacturer to cut all of your longest boards to fit into the machine.

I need to match an old heart pine floor for repairs or for an addition. What do I need to tell you?

There are many questions to answer including lengths, color matching, knots, grain pattern, growth rings and face width and thickness. To assure the best possible match to an old heart pine floor we ask you to mail us a small piece so we can check the milling. You also need to measure whether the flooring is all the same width. The number and size of knots and the grain pattern of the original floor are the most critical factors to ensure that the wood we sell you is an appropriate match.

What do I call the match if it’s not flooring match?

Tongue & groove can be “flooring match” where the standard is 8/32 on top, 9/32 in the tongue and 7/32 wood below the tongue for a ¾” thick product. “Center match” is an older milling technique where the tongue and groove is in the center of the board. If you have an old floor that you are trying to match, you may find that you have neither center match nor flooring match and may need custom milling. None of this is to be confused with “end matching” which calls for a tongue & groove on the ends of the boards and is generally done only for floors such as oak that are short, 2’ – 4’ on average.

What would be the maximum lengths for a 5/8” floor?

There is no reason to make 5/8” floor. Boards that thin tend to “sweep” and can’t be securely glued down. We have, however, done a floor using 3/8” boards with lengths of 3 feet.

How old are your Cherry logs? What is the average # of knots per 100SF?
How would you compare Northern Cherry versus Southern Cherry versus your Wild Black Cherry?

The Wild Black Cherry we offer comes from 50-75 year old trees. Many are 2-3 feet in diameter. These trees had few lower branches meaning it runs very clear with few knots. There tends to be more figure and the wood maintains more of the red & pink tones as opposed to the northern cherry that turns a darker brown with age. At most, cherry will have 15-20 sound and tight small knots per 100 SF.

What else comes as wide as heart pine and what is the cost difference?

Barry Strup of The Woods Company sells antique oak 7-10” random width at $9.40/SF and chestnut 7-10” random width for $11.20/SF. All defects and character marks are left in at these prices – no grading is done.
You allow knots in all ‘non-clear’ products, 1-1/4” or smaller and the knot ‘excludes casing’.

What is casing?

The casing is the wood that immediately surrounds the knot. Because we only allow for sound, tight knots, of 1 ¼” or less, the casing adds very little to the overall diameter of the knot.

I really don’t want a red patina. What else do you have?

Antique Heart Cypress has warm brown tones or you could keep the Heart Pine from turning red with an ultra violet inhibitor in the finish.

My bathroom has linoleum over a plywood floor. How can I get a wood floor and what kind of wood is suitable?

Because a bathroom can have a good deal of variation in moisture levels, I would recommend using a vertical grain pattern because it expands & contracts through the thickness rather than the width of the board. You may also want to consider applying a sealer to the back of the flooring that will add stability. Vertical heart cypress would be a good choice due to the high resistance to decay due to moisture.