Awesome #DIY Tip Spline for filling cracks in #floors

by Donna
(New Jersey)

I have cracks in a portion of my 1920's wood flood from a bad patch job where the replacement boards were not made with tongue and groove boards like the original floor. When the floor was refinished about 10 years ago, the finisher used wood fill in the cracks. It was fine for a while, but over the years, the wood fill has since cracked and all but disappeared leaving cracks where dirt can fall into the basement below (there is no subfloor in this old house). I'm thinking recessing thin black spline in the cracks might be the solution as the spline is flexible and could handle the movement of the floor better than wood fill. Has anyone else used round foam spline for this with any success? I suspect I would need to purchase a variety of spline widths to account for the variation in the spaces between the boards.

Hi Donna;

Thats a great idea!

Foam spline in larger sizes is used as a gap filler in window and door installation as well as to seal gaps in concrete work. Usually in those applications the gap filler goes in first and then caulk goes on top.

You can certainly push spline into the gaps between floor boards and as long as you choose a spline thats slightly wider than the gap, it will stay there. You are right about the spline allowing the boards to move.

It would stop dirt get into the cracks in the floorboards too. Now if we could get the manufacturers to dye the foam to the floor colour you would have yourself a cool new product!