How to Install Baseboards - Step-by-Step for Beginners

hey dan perry here and in this video i'm going to show you a fast and efficient method for installing baseboard step by step i'm going to show you how these are going to make the job easier better and save you a ton of time now i've seen a lot of other videos out there that make this way too complicated and time-consuming so i'm going to show you a faster and easier way to get professional results now this is a great project for just about any beginner diy-er and i have a lot of tips to share so let's jump right in the first step is to measure the baseboards so grab a notepad a pencil a measuring tape and a couple small pieces of the baseboard if you have some scraps laying around if not don't worry about it then go room by room measuring each wall where a baseboard is going to be even the really small spaces take measurements to the nearest 1 16 of an inch for inside corners where the baseboard is going to fit between the walls round down to the nearest 1 16 of an inch for outside corners where it's going to wrap around the wall round up to the nearest 1 16 of an inch now each measurement should have three values when you write it down you want to write down the length of the baseboard the left cut spec and the right cut spec so for example on this wall i would write down 29 and 1 8 of an inch for the length and then i 45 and 045 so that means on the left side i'm going to cut for a 45 degree angle for an inside corner and on the right side i'm going to create a 45 degree angle for an outside corner here's a quick tip that's going to save you time and give you more accurate measurements when measuring outside corners this is an outside corner right here the thing that you need to consider is the baseboard is actually going to be longer than the wall here and in order to get the exact right measurement so you can get precise measurements and only make one cut is get a couple of scrap pieces a couple small scrap pieces put one on one side one on the other side of the wall then you can pull your tape and get an accurate measurement that way next calculate how much baseboard you need you won't need much extra if you're careful and experienced but if you rarely or never use a miter saw get five to ten percent extra so you can make some mistakes without wasting too much time you can purchase baseboard by the linear foot or you can buy contractor packs that usually come in packs of 10 and are 12 feet long you can buy either mdf or wood baseboards mdf is what i recommend because it's the easiest to work with and it's the least expensive now once you've purchased everything the first step is to paint painting the molding before installation will save you from having to mask off the floor to paint later using a four inch paint roller with a good semi-gloss self-leveling paint like sherwin-williams emerald urethane trim enamel will give you a smooth finish however you can use a regular acrylic paint but you'll get a bit of stippling as you see here or if you use a brush you'll see brush marks rarely will anyone ever notice this but if you really want a smooth finish either get a self-leveling paint or add a bit of flow troll to your acrylic paint ideally paint two coats but one will work just fine with baseboards that come pre-primed like these ones and once painted let the baseboards dry for at least one day now you're ready to start cutting using the cut list you created initially carefully and precisely cut each baseboard using a miter saw cut the longest pieces first because you'll be able to use the offcut to cut the shorter pieces once the longer pieces are cut label them with the room they belong to as you go because this is going to save you a lot of time trying to figure out where they go later now you'll need to pay attention to the angles that you cut the baseboards on each end and this can be tricky if you rarely use a miter saw you're almost guaranteed going to make some mistakes here so take your time and think things through taking your time will actually save you time because you'll make fewer mistakes here's a tip to get tighter fitting corner joints so walls are supposed to be 90 degrees however with the mud buildup the drywall mud the walls end up having a point so they're not actually 90 degrees so instead of cutting your corners at 45 degrees you'll want to cut them at 45 and a half degrees or in some cases even 46 degrees but if you just go to 45 and a half degrees as a general rule that's going to work pretty well in most corners now on inside corners the same thing applies the drywall mud buildup creates a situation where you want to change the angle slightly so for inside corners instead of cutting them at 45 cut them at 44 and a half degrees now the inside corners aren't as important as the outside corners because you could easily just caulk those but the gaps that are going to show here are going to be very noticeable and you're going to want to make these nice and tight now the fun part which is installing the baseboards this will go pretty fast if you made accurate measurements and cuts so you should have all your pieces labeled so you can easily determine what room they go in and then just put them in place and kind of dry fit everything before you start nailing stuff in to make sure it all fits you're also going to want to carry a couple tools with you you're going to want to have a knife and something to scrape and pry with this is useful for a number of things including scraping off caulking or prying a baseboard off if you've nailed it on and you need to move it and then the other thing you want to have are these popsicle sticks now this is a really handy thing to have because unlike shims they're very consistent thickness so let's say this didn't line up perfectly i could just install a shim there it would bring it out just a tiny bit like if this board was just a little bit too long instead of having to go make a cut i could just put this popsicle stick in there nail it in and then cut off the popsicle stick and it's especially handy on the inside corners inside corners will tend to have gaps after you nail them in so if you push on the bottom of an inside corner it might sink in and create a gap especially at the bottom so use popsicle sticks as you see me doing here that you again you can find in the paint department or you could use shims but they're less consistent thickness and they're a little more difficult to use and put them in the bottom to move the baseboards out so the inside corners sit nice and snug these popsicle sticks are really the key to getting perfect inside corners without having to cope your baseboards which saves a lot of time and makes it so much easier [Music] now if you're installing your baseboards over hard flooring you'll likely have gaps created by uneven floors in some cases you can just push down on the baseboard before nailing it in and it will conform to the floor easily and this is another benefit of using mdf baseboards in other cases you might have to shave a little bit of the baseboard off here's how to do that take a shim and insert it underneath the baseboard where the gap is the largest and then make a mark at the thickness where it just meets the baseboard then take that shim over to where you need to shave off some of the baseboard place your pencil on that mark and slide the shim across so you can mark the baseboard and get a perfect contoured line to where to cut to then use a miter saw or orbital sander to remove the material up to that line then put them back in place and you should have a well-fitting baseboard that curves along with your warped floor once you've dry fit all the baseboards go along with an 18 gauge brad nailer with two inch brad nails and nail the baseboards every 12 to 16 inches now i've seen some people recommend that you need to go around and find every single stud and then mark the location so you can nail onto those studs and let me tell you why that's a complete waste of time okay there's a few places where you can reliably hit a stud no matter where you're going to nail the first one is the bottom plate so there's a stud that runs all the way across the bottom of every single wall that the vertical studs are actually attached to so an inch and a half off the subfloor and you know with this floor this floor is about a quarter inch thick on top of the subfloor so an inch and a quarter up no matter where i nail on this board down here it's going to hit a stud and you can see this nail is about an inch off the ground but there's no nails on the top here at all but yet i can't even pull this baseboard away if i tried and then once i caulk it it's going to be even more secure to the wall the only time you need to find a stud is if you are doing really tall baseboards or if your baseboards are loose in an area and you want to tighten them up to the wall toward the top another place you can reliably find a stud is in the corners and on the ends of every single wall so i always hit a couple of nails in on the end of each baseboard one on the top one on the bottom and then all the way across the rest of the way just about an inch up and i take my nail gun and angle it just down slightly so i guarantee that i hit that bottom plate and it's nice and secure no need for any stud finders and wasting a bunch of time in some cases the wall is going to be longer than the baseboard in that case you're going to cut a 45 degree angle on both of the baseboards that you want to seam together and then nail them together at the seam as you see here and then in some cases you're going to want to put a small end piece on the baseboard to end it in the middle of a wall and since nailing isn't going to work very well for that you're going to want to glue it with either some caulking or some wood glue taping it like i'm doing here is a really easy way to make sure it lines up once all the baseboards have been installed the next step is to caulk them i prefer this acrylic latex plus silicone because it's very easy to work with and it cleans up really easily so if you kind of get some on the wall or something you can wipe it up pretty easily to apply the caulking cut a small angled hole in the caulking and you want the hole to be small because it's way easier to work with and you'll reduce the chances of making a mess so apply the caulking and then go back with your finger to smooth it out i like to wear gloves because i don't like the chemicals getting on my fingers and it's better to apply too little caulking than too much caulking because you can easily go back and add more if necessary but if you add too much you're just going to get it all over the place and of course you can get a rag handy and kind of wipe that up as you go which is going to be necessary anyway but it's easier to put on too little than too much additionally you only want to apply a small amount of caulking at a time before you go back and wipe it otherwise it dries pretty quickly and then it gets clumpy and very difficult to work with and you create a bad finish also you do not want to caulk against the floor you only caulk against the wall and in the joints and against other trim now if you're going for a perfectly smooth finish you can use some wood filler to fill the nail holes but if you're not being paid to do this professionally and if you have better things to do than spend all day filling tiny little holes that nobody is going to notice anyway you can skip this step you have my permission once the caulking dries it's time to get the paint out grab a small high quality paint brush and paint the caulking and dab any nail holes as well this will cover them up for the most part you'll just be able to see a dent in the baseboard if you look closely now don't worry about getting it on the wall you'll go back and paint the wall later let that first coat of paint dry then go back and mask off the baseboards and paint the wall there's a lot of opinions on whether you should mask off the walls or just cut the line with a brush without using any tape but i've tried both many times and i'm convinced that taping is both easier faster and less frustrating especially for di wires it's also more comfortable because you don't have to get so low and hunched down there forever then remove the tape by pulling away at a sharp angle so you get that nice crisp line and you're all set for a complete list of tools and materials with links to buy visit handymanstartup.com forward slash baseboards [Music] [Music] you

Channel: Handyman Startup

Views: 457,426

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Id: wfsmfJ_tkuk

Length: 13min 21sec (801 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 13 2022