how to install shoe molding without a nail gun

 

Dear Homeowner,

We’ve decided to make a quick tutorial on how to install shoe molding without a nail gun. This is for all you people who don’t have a nail gun and want to install your own molding. 

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All you need is your two hands, some tape measure and measuring tape, and the patience of Job. Let’s get started!

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1) Measure the length of shoe molding that you need from where it meets the floor (on one side) up to 3 inches above where it meets the top wall where it will end at (half-wall height). 

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2) Cut an 18 inch strip using your saw or miter box if applicable. 3) Measure in another 3 inches from where it will meet the top wall and draw a line. We want to cut the strip that has 18 inches right now, into two pieces of 9 inches each. 

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You’re going to use one piece for each side of the shoe molding on your half-wall. Keep in mind that this length from which you cut out the 12 inch long strip is what will become your “nailless piece”, hence why we call it that way. 

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So once you draw this line and make this cut, you will end up with two pieces of half your molding 2 inches longer than the actual length of shoe molding. 

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4) Take one of these additional half-pieces and measure it into a straight line, from the tip of the shoe molding strip to where it meets 3 inches from its other side. 

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Make both your measurements carefully and mark off each one of them accordingly. You are going to want to end up with two strips for each side, 9 inches long each, that’s how long you made the half-pieces for when we made our cuts earlier. 

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Make all your measurements carefully as we’ll need this soon. 5) Next, you are going to need to mark off where your shoe molding strip ends. 

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You’ll notice that it is about 3 inches above your top wall (half-wall height). We want to make a mark right there. 

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6) You may need to take measurements of your walls or the room in general in order to find out where the nail heads are located. 

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We found ours at approximately 5-7 inches above our floor and 6-10 inches from one corner of our room. 

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What you’re doing is taking this measurement and putting it into a “formula” that we will give you shortly, once we know exactly where they are located. 

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You can use your tape measure to determine this measurement. 7) Once you have your formula for determining where these nail heads are located

we need to know exactly how many nails we need to use in order to get our strips cut where we want them. In order to do this, you are going to need a tape measure again. You’re going to measure from one side of the strip (from the tip of shoe molding up to where it meets 3 inches from the other foot of shoe molding) and take it all the way across (horizontally).

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