How to Install Hardwood Floors Without a Pneumatic Stapler

Pry off the shoe molding or quarter round, if your room has it, and baseboards around the room with a small pry bar.

Measure from the bare wall to the width of one board plus 3/4 inch, and mark it on the underlayment paper with a pencil or chalk. A 3/4-inch gap between the wall and the flooring allows for seasonal wood expansion and contraction due to humidity changes. If your baseboards are thin and you will not use shoe molding or quarter-round at the seam between the baseboard and floor, the gap can be slightly smaller to prevent open space between the flooring and baseboard. Continue measuring and marking the paper along the wall for a straight starting line. Mark the location of each floor joist on the underlayment. Flooring should run perpendicular to the direction of the joists.

Set the first flooring board in place along the wall with the tongue facing out and aligned with the straight line on the underlayment.

Drill pilot holes for nails through the board using a power drill with a 1/16-inch bit. The first row must be face nailed, regardless of whether you will hide the nails in the remaining rows. Using a nailer or hammering the nails only through the tongues of the first row would leave the edge closest to the wall loose and unstable. Drill the pilot holes 1 inch in from the edge, along both long sides of the board at each joist mark.

Drive barbed flooring or cut nails through the drilled holes and into the subfloor with a hammer. If you are not using decorative cut nails, leave approximately 1/8 inch of the nail head raised above the board’s surface. Cut or square nails will not countersink and should remain visible.

Countersink the nail heads, if necessary, by tapping them with a nail-set tool and a hammer until the heads are just below the surface of the board. Avoid sinking them deep enough to leave a hole that must be filled.

Butt the short end of the second board of the first row against the exposed, short end of the first board of the first row. Force the tongue and groove together where the short ends of the two boards meet by striking the exposed end of the second board with a mallet. Drill and nail the second board to the floor. Continue across the row, tapping a new board to the end of the last fastened board, then drilling and nailing them accordingly, until the first single row of flooring that is closest to the wall is complete from left to right.

Return to the beginning of the first row, where you fastened the first board to the floor. Set a new board on the floor in front of the first board with the long tongue facing out and the long groove against the tongue of the first nailed board. Tap the two together with the mallet.

Place the manual nailer’s edge flush against the tongue edge of the new board, if you intend to hide the nails, then strike the nailer with a mallet. Follow the tool’s instructions. Operation can vary slightly, and some require a special mallet. Alternatively, drive flooring nails through the tongue edge of the board and into the floor at each joist mark with a hammer, then countersink each nail. Because the tongue projects out from the board, maneuvering a hammer into the space to fully drive the flooring nails through the tongue is difficult and can cause the tongue to break. Raised nails that you did not countersink can impede the next board's ability to slip into place at the tongue-and-groove joint. Complete as much of the remaining floor in the same manner until the nailer or hammer will not fit into the space as you near the opposite wall. If you have chosen to face nail all boards throughout the floor, drill the boards and nail them as you did with the first row.

Set the final one or two rows of boards into place without nailing them. The rows closest to the wall opposite the starting point must be face nailed, regardless of whether you hid or exposed the nails in the body of the floor. Drill pilot holes through the boards at the joist marks and nail them to the floor as you did with the first row using barbed flooring nails, or decorative cut or square nails.