Laying Solid Oak

[jedmc571]

I'm about to undertake a job for a friend in 2weeks time, to lay 90sqm of 18mm solid oak.

One thing has always puzzled me though..........

If you have to allow for expansion and contraction, how is this affected by porta nailing it to the substrate :shock:

3/4s of the floor is floorboards, the rest ( a new extension ) is concrete, with this in mind, what would you suggest the best way to go about the prep, and any details of sticky stuff for the concrete?

Much appreciated

Jed

 

[squib]

Lay battens down first if you can get away with the difference in levels (20mm thick absolute min),if not then sikaflex is your friend on the concrete section.

 

[chippy1970]

Might be best to email Sika get advice direct from them. I have layed a few floors lately using Sikabond T54 which comes in either sausages for use in a gun or a tin for spreading with a trowel.

Its quiet easy when you get the hang of it and there is no need to glue the flooring together like you would if floating the floor. Its great on concrete floors, use the primer a day or 2 before laying the floor and it sticks really well.

Check with Sika you might be able to stick the whole floor rather than porta nail half of it where the existing wood floor is, they are the experts they will know wether thats possible or not.

www.sika.co.uk

Another thought is if you can ply over the whole floor and where the ply covers the concrete stick the ply down with Sikabond, then you can just porta nail the whole floor.

Only a few thoughts of mine but I dont specialize in floors I am a carpenter/joiner so maybe a specialist will come along soon :lol:

 

[RogerS]

Don't, whatever you do, get tempted to use those rolls of sticky foam for use on the concrete.

 

[Anonymous]

Don't, whatever you do, get tempted to use those rolls of sticky foam for use on the concrete.

why not? I've got 18 sqm to do next year. Half floor boards and half tiled (over concrete). Not sure whether to pull up the tiles up first.

If ply is used to cover the whole floor do you then nail into the ply? Is 18mm ply thick enough to nail into?

Dave

 

[TrimTheKing]

I had 65m of inch thick oak put down in my old house and they glued it down, and that was on concrete. They sealed the concrete first with some kind of PVA. I would go that way if I had to do it Jed.

Don't know what the glue was but any flooring place (or the advice here/google) should be able to tell you.

 

[RogerS]

Don't, whatever you do, get tempted to use those rolls of sticky foam for use on the concrete.

why not? I've got 18 sqm to do next year. Half floor boards and half tiled (over concrete). Not sure whether to pull up the tiles up first.

If ply is used to cover the whole floor do you then nail into the ply? Is 18mm ply thick enough to nail into?

Dave

If the tiles are down securely then I'd leave them. The foam stuff is really difficult to get a good tight fit, it is horrible to work with and the floor ends up floating.

 

[Triggaaar]

I'm about to undertake a job for a friend in 2weeks time, to lay 90sqm of 18mm solid oak.

That is a lot...

If you have to allow for expansion and contraction, how is this affected by porta nailing it to the substrate :shock:

My experience of solid oak floors is not a good one. They love to move. Does it have to be solid, or could you use engineered? And is the area large in both directions, or is it long and thin (short & wide) - because if it's longer one way then the other, it would help if the boards run in the direction of the longest section, as the boards obviously move across their width. If it's correctly nailed down I guess it has a chance of working, I'll be interested to see what the flooring experts here recommend.

3/4s of the floor is floorboards, the rest ( a new extension ) is concrete, with this in mind, what would you suggest the best way to go about the prep

Obviously keep the wood where it's going to be laid for a few weeks to acclimatise. How old is the extension, and the concrete (or screed?) floor? Can you take moisure readings?

Are you thinking of using an undelay over the concrete area?

 

[ondablade]

Just waffling here, but the classic set up in this part of the world if going over battens is:

1. Treated timber battens, 50mm square or so secured by hammer fixings over polythene DP membrane. (concrete floors sometimes have a lean mix sand and cement screed on top that can be stripped off fairly easily to make vertical space)
2. Find your level relative to other floors, use a laser while working.
3. Level under the battens using timber shims, making sure the battens are supported and fixed to the floor underneath at close intervals (say 350 - 400mm) or it'll squeak like buggery. It's very tempting to shortcut on levelling and fixing, but is likely to be regretted.
4. Space the joints in the planks (100mm) using 1mm or so thick washers.
5. Secret nail into the corner of the tongue.
6. Leave 12 - 15mm all round between the floor and the wall (under the skirting for movement), and use 15mm square cork strip glued to the edge of the timber where it's visible like at hearths.

Plan B i've also used where there isn't enough depth for battens is to glue the planks together, and lay them flat over a sheet of 2mm polythene foam. This also needs clearance around the walls. Too large an area (can't remember what the limits are) done this way can invite splitting as the stress of the cumulative movement can get too much.

Back in days of yore they used to set wood block parquet in pitch - it presumably acted as both an adhesive and a damp proof layer.

Which makes the Sika mastic sound promising. But for sure you would need a thick enough bed off the stuff if it was to handle the shear induced by the fairly sizeable movement you could get - it could fail over time. Might be expensive over a very large area, especially if the underlying surface was not quite flat. Levelling beforehand sounds like it might be the plan..

 

[RogerS]

Another benefit of keeping the battens to a short spacing such as 35-400mm is that it minimises wastage when cutting the floorboards to length.

You can by plastic spacers 1/2/3/5/10mm thick for packing from places like Screwfix.

 

[squib]

Just found this and thought it may help....SikaBond®
High performance PU adhesives for wood floor bonding and multipurpose bonding.

Liquid Batten System
SikaBond Liquid Batten System makes it possible to install all types of wood flooring on any substrate, for example, screeds, concrete, tiles, stone, metal, thermoplastic flooring and timber. Due to the versatility of SikaBond, it has the advantage of compensating for variations in floor levels by taking our surface irregularities.

With the ability to bond solid and engineered timber flooring directly to the sub-floor, SikaBond eliminates the need for fixing battens and raising of thresholds. Once cured SikaBond is fully elastic. This allows the differential movement between the bonded surfaces without hte risk of delamination. When fixing timber with SikaBond, adjustments can be made up to 1 hour after application.

Fully Bonded System
SikaBond® fully bonded system is a single component trowel applied adhesive with excellent sound absorbing qualities. When cured I provides a high bond strength and can be used for all types of wood flooring. SikaBond is solvent and moisture free, odourless and ready to use. When cured it is fully elastic providing footfall sound dampening properties. Further reductions can be made in sound transmission when used in conjunction with Sika® Silent Layer Mat.

Sound Insulating System
Sika® AcouBond® system comprises of SikaBond® single component gun grade elastic adhesive and the Sika® Silent Layer Mat. Together these Sika products provide a unique combination of elastic bonding technology and excellent sound reducing properties. Sika® AcouBond® system provides the ideal solution to both impact and reflective noise whenever timber floor finishes are installed.

 

[Jake]

There are loads of these adhesives. Sikabond is famous and a very good make.

After researching this for my glue-down oak floor, I came to the conclusion that the best type of flooring glue is MS Polymer based. I don't think Sika do one, but F Ball do and various others do.

 

[TrimTheKing]

My experience of solid oak floors is not a good one. They love to move.

I had 25mm thick solid oak laid over the whole floor of a converted barn (my last house), glued down, boards running the length of the house and it's been down for 3 years now with absolutely no visible movement whatsoever and no problem with anything coming loose.

Each one's different I guess...

 

[mack9110000]

If heights will not be an issue battens,spaced at 400mm max would be my choice but instead of gluing down,which can get messy for the uninitiated,I would use Elastilon.It's a bit more expensive than the glue products but very effective and also cleaner and easier to use.
mack

 

[RogerS]

If heights will not be an issue battens,spaced at 400mm max would be my choice but instead of gluing down,which can get messy for the uninitiated,I would use Elastilon.It's a bit more expensive than the glue products but very effective and also cleaner and easier to use.
mack

Not in my experience. I found it very difficult to use and the end results were very disappointing. I also hate a floating floor.

 

[mack9110000]

If the instructions are followed,any competent DIYer should be able to cope with Elastilon,but I'm only a humble flooring contractor,what would I know.
mack

 

[chippy1970]

Heres a couple of pics of a solid oak floor I laid earlier this year using Sikabond in the foil sausages. Its a brand new house in Kingston upon Thames which we did all the carpentry work on. The floor was sanded and sealed by another company. What I would say is check the moisture level in the floor we had to wait about 8 weeks for the wood to aclimatize as it was a new build and there was a lot of wet plaster etc.

I have since used the trowel on Sikabond and thats pretty good too, I have been back in the house above since and the floor still looks great there are no signs of any movement gaps or anything so Sika does an excelent job.