Skirting boards – Pine/MDF/Hardwood

Hi All,

Does anyone have any views on fitting or appearence of skirting boards.

I’m doing up my 1900’s Cardiff terrace and need new skirting boards, the old ones were retrofit rubbish and went in the skip but not sure what to replace them with material wise (shape wise it will be 150mm Torus) as there doesn’t seem to be an clear winner:

Pine: About £2.50/m. Will need lots of coats of paint and grain pattern is rather open and strong which differs from the orginal wood elsewhere which after 100 years of paint, filler and the like actually has very little visible grain.

MDF: About £2.50m. Feels like cheating somehow, will the fakeness be obvious once finished? Far less painting and fiddling with knots etc. Nice and smooth.

Hardwood: £10/m so ££. All the skirting will be painted so no benefit in the visual appearence appart from I think the grain will be more comparable to the rest of the wood and not ruined with knots.

Any views? I will be doing the painting but paying someone else to fit after wood floor installation (possibly the floor fitter). What do joiners like to work with?

Any thoughts, opinions or experience welcomed.

keppoch.

We had MDF ones made and fitted by the bloke who fitted the wooden flooring in our kitchen/diner. He machined them into a nice modern design (didn’t want the pretend Victorian type that most wood ones seem to be). Looks fab painted.

MDF’s the only way to go, as long as you aren’t fussed about getting a fancy profile. Once painted they look like painted skirting boards just depends if you want to avoid the new house look, and go period I guess 🙂

MDF

Nailed and gripfilled to the walls.

MDF – I prefer to use water based gloss paint but I’ve yet to find a knotting fluid that doesn’t eventually come through the paint.

We specify MDF for my jobs

We used pine, mainly because the profile and height we wanted wasn’t available in mdf. It takes a lot of painting, if I had the choice would have gone for mdf I think.

Having sanded and filled and painted every other square millimetre of wood in the house I know I don’t want to get into salvage stuff so new is the only option. Although I feel like MDF is cheating some extent (work on house has seem to bring out personal tendancy to do everything the hard, slow way!) I think the MDF will actually look better as the grain of the pine is so open and I just can’t justify the hardwood at that price.

Not quite sure how the skirting will get fitted as the (new) plaster stops some 90-100mm above the ground and so unless filled there would be a cavity behind much of the skirting. Hopefully that is one the skirting board fitter can overcome.

keppoch.

the (new) plaster stops some 90-100mm above the ground

This is to allow space for heating pipes to be installed and is standard practice I think.

You rough arse ernie!! 😆
MDF Plugged, screwed and grip filled!

If you use pine, touch in the knots with knotting solution, or they’ll bleed into your paint. You may also need to fill in the odd missing knot, and sand smooth

I used pine, but we have an old house and I wanted to match the existing skirting. I actually like having a little visible grain, but each to his own…

Don’t get me wrong I am not trying to eliminate woodgrain but it would be quite different I think (windowsill in one of the rooms is pine and clashes a bit with the rest of the wood in that room).

Consensus seems to be the MDF then.

Interesting point about putting the pipes behind the skirting! I might take the opportunity to do that in advance as I need to get a plumber in for some other work.

Thanks all.

keppoch

Poplar.

MDF Plugged, screwed and grip filled!

Oh nice, dirty great big holes to fit the screws heads in, which can never be filled properly in MDF. Paslode brads leave nothing more than pinholes, and hold the skirting until the gripfill does its job.

And why would you need gripfill if done your way……..in case the screws “broke” ?

It’s skirting we’re talking about, not studwork on a dodgy wall, and if it’s resting on the floor it doesn’t even need to carry its own weight.

……I take it you’re winding me up 😀

MDF? Environmentally pretty bad innit?

Hardwood a complete waste of time – I’ll take your money and burn it for you if you like 😉 )

Pine – will look “right” – a few knots/grain/imperfections whatever will be sympathetic in a house that age where the MDF won’t, IMO.

For the age of the house, I’d say Pine (just select it carefully), don’t forget to prime the back of it either, knotted, primed, undercoat, top coat. All done on trestles until fitted, then touched up.

Love fitting mdf skirting, but hate how it looks.

If painting, NSF for ease of fitting

All done on trestles until fitted, then touched up.

Yep. Three coats of paint when it’s already been fitted is a mighty PITA. Guess how I know…

Don’t worry I have already spotted the potential to pre-paint it all 🙂

After all the contortions of preparing the other woodwork in-situ I have no intention of doing that if preventable!

I like the thought of fast preparation of the mdf but as DD says I think the end result will be best achieved with wood so I think hunting for the best most knot-free pine is likely to be the best compromise.

Btw, priming (couple of coats maybe) the back of the board helps to stop it dishing once it’s on the wall. Shrinkage with pine these days is inevitable unless you season it flat in the house for around two years 🙂 🙄

I’ll try using that one the mrs Dd, just tell her the towel radiator under our bed has been seasoning for the last 7 yrs. 😉

Probably needs a bit more though wrightyson 😀

+1 for MDF

if you are going to paint the skirting anyway then go for MDF. proper wood is a pain and only makes sense IMO if you are going to have it on show, i.e. not painted, but stained. the knots can be concealed if you have the patience. fill in the holes with filla, sand it back and fill again. but ultimately pointless if it’s being painted…

@ the guy who wanted high skirting…… ask your local joiner shop to cut some 12mm or 18mm mdf into strips the height that you want and he should be able to cut some fancy shape, too.

Painted mdf never looks as good as painted wood. The mouldings always look rough as a badgers arse. And you can’t rub back coats the same as you can with wood. For sure, the mdf is easier to paint but looks worse. Just depends on how much work you want to put in. For best possible skirting, then order poplar. But nobody’s going to pay that much.

Right you lot this is all great advice. After spending so much time on the rest of the woodwork it seems a shame to take a shortcut at the last moment. Having read your opinions but espcially that that the MDF will never look quite the same as painted wood I am erring towards the pine solution espcially as someone has offered to help me with this whilst I continue the woodwork equivalent of painting the Forth bridge around the rest of the house 🙂

I think picking where I buy it from will have a lot to do with it. I looked in a builders merchants and a Homebase (because I was passing) at the weekend. Not only was the Homebase skirting 4x as much but it was cracked, riddled with knots and oozing resin. So I intend to take a look at a few different offerings and get some neat looking pine.

Now tell me how to do the fireplace! 😀

http://singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/chicken-or-egg-fireplace-or-hearth

I have used bespoke pine throughout my house as I wanted a 9″ skirting but the shrinkage is the biggest probem, I used unsorted red wood which is about the best but its all kiln dried and not properly seasoned. A lot of my skirtings were scribed to a parquet floor perfectly but a year down the line there is a gap of around 5 mm due to shrinkage, not a problem if you have carpets.
I sanded with 2 grades and then wire wooled with 2 grades, wood dye then clear matt varnish, all screw heads are plugged the finish is excellent and every one comments on the wood work but alot of work.
MDF’s great to work and doesn’t move but wrong in a victorian house imo.