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Good Hope Hardwoods - Walnut Slabs & Specialty Hardwood Lumber

Feet or no feet?

Posts

Feet or no feet?

#1

Feet or no feet?

Barry Irby

I made some white oak chairs for my son and DIL. I put buttons or feet on them. Basically a nail with a rubber washer and a white plastic button. I put one larger one on the front legs and two smaller ones on the rear legs to accommodate the shape of the legs. The White plastic is failing. Cracking and falling off. Tile floor.

Traditionally I have rounded off the corners on the ends of the legs to prevent splintering and just let the wood hit the floor.

So, do you put buttons on the bottoms of legs? If so, what?

Trying to decide if I should remove all of them or replace the bad ones. Afraid the nails will scratch the floor.

Re: Feet or no feet?

#2

Re: Feet or no feet?

Paul Leuba

I do not like the plastic buttons because of the nail presence and imminent floor damage when they fail, which they always do. I like the felt pads with adhesive, except they have short useful life, and your faced with cleaning off old adhesive and sometimes sanding the leg contact surface to get the next pad to stick. They require frequent attention.

I’ve had the best results with the nylon caps that fit over the bottom inch or so of the leg. Longevity and non-marring of the floor is their positive points. On the negative side they require the chair leg to be round, at least for the bottom inch or so of the chair.

If you leave the legs unprotected, on a tile floor that should work well. The wood will certainly not mark or otherwise damage the tile. There will be some leg wear overtime, but end grain white oak is pretty durable. I’d tend to go with the bare leg ends in the conditions you described.

Paul in Hunt Valley, MD

Re: Feet or no feet?

#3

Re: Feet or no feet?

Ralph Lipeles

I originally used the self stick felt pads that are available in most hardware stores. After a while they fell off. I then made my own. I got a piece of thin walled metal tubing and sharpened one end. I then used this tool to cut disks from a sheet of 1/4" thick felt. removed the metal buttons that were on the stool legs, sanded the leg bottoms , mixed up some 2 part epoxy and, using 2 strips of masking tape, attached a disk to the bottom of each stool leg. That was about 25 years ago. During that time only one disk has fallen off.

Re: Feet or no feet?

#4

Re: Feet or no feet?

Paul Leuba

That’s an encouraging approach, Ralph. The felt pads are perfect for hardwood floors. The lengthy useful life of the felt pads with the approach you described is pretty amazing. How extensively are those chairs used?

Paul in Hunt Valley, MD

Re: Feet or no feet?

#5

Ellis Walentine

+1 on felt pads

Ellis Walentine

I don't mind replacing them when they fall off. We use them on stools on a tile floor, and they do a great job. They're quiet and hold up quite well. I like Ralph's custom pad solution, too.

One other trick I've used on tables is to drill shallow holes into the bottoms of the legs and glue hardwood plugs into them. Noisier and more slippery than felt, but longer lasting.

Ellis

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