[VAC] Re: A/S Floor Repair

[RJ & Krista <radiodial@xxxxxxxx>]

Harvey,
I sometimes get ribbed as being too focused on the "right way" of
restoring - I attribute it to my folks who were antique collectors who
would utter oaths whenever they came across a butcher job repair on an
otherwise nice piece.  Add to that my grandfathers admonitions of
"anything worth doing, is worth doing right", and "there are no
shortcuts to fixing things correctly, only time consuming detours".

Relating back to the floor repair.  There are three kinds of repairs:  
Permanent repairs (restoration)
Temporary repairs (arrested decay)
Destructive repairs (irreversible damage)

In the floors case, the permanent repair will be the eventual
replacement of the floor someday, maybe by you or maybe the next owner. 
There are never permanent "owners" of anything in this world, just
permenent "destroyers" (how's that for some New Year heavy thought?)

The temporary repair is one to prevent further damage and to allow use. 
This is the fiberglass and epoxy repairs used on rot affected areas,
like Marc's repair using the resin and the drilled holes.  I have used
wood epoxy to replace rotted areas.  The only thing I might ad to Marc's
technique is that for large holes, it is best to provide a doubler
underneath to keep the material in place - resin & epoxy have no load
bearing (walking) strength unless reinforced internally or externally.

In this out of sight subfloor scenario, there is no destructive repair
unless you sawzall into a frame member or rip out the cabinets to get to
rotted section, and then forget how to reinstall the cabinets - or leave
them outside in the rain.  The resin in the belly pan and the perimeter
floor channel won't hinder a future floor replacement.  We'll save that
classification for "ripping out the original gas lamp and plumbing
because you never use it anyway" category :>)

Hope your year's endeavors are successful ones,
RJ