We live in a 1500 sqft house, that was about half tile and half carpet. Most of the carpet had been stained by age and cats. About two years ago we decided on wood and purchased about 800 sq ft of Virginia Mills Hand-scraped Birch solid wood flooring from Lumber Liquidators.
The wood was stored until installation in a spare bedroom, but with a baby on the way the race was on to get the floors down, and turn the spare bedroom into a nursery.
Over the two years, we had a few quotes from contractors, but we hadn't found anyone who'd come in and really struck us as knowing what they were doing. It was a long wait before someone recommended a floor contractor called Paul.
Paul came in and gave us a quote that was a bit above some of the other quotes, but he came recommended and gave us a pretty good feeling that he really knew his stuff and would do a solid job.
For a homeowner, prep work for laying a wood floor means getting everything possible off the floor surface, removing carpets and nail strips and getting the floors as clean as possible.
Our house was built in the late 1970's and our floors are concrete, and just a tad above the soil level outside.
Getting everything out of the four rooms (master, office 1, office 2 and nursery) was a job that took maybe a week, spread over about a month. We did a final push in the two weeks prior to the contractor coming in, and boxed up and pretty much filled the garage with the former room contents.
As the rooms emptied, we used box cutters to strip the carpet edges and removed nail strips with a hammer and screwdriver. This is an ugly ugly job when the strips are old, sometime (cat) peed on, and nailed into concrete.
Starting at 7:30am, Paul and an employee moved the heavy furniture out. Luckily we have a covered patio and there was space there for several heavy items. The rest of the carpet was rolled up and moved to a pile outside for disposal with the dusty eight year old underlay.
The dirtiest and hardest part of the job was next, with 10 square feet of tile between three of the rooms to be removed to allow the wood to be continuous between three of the four rooms. This is a noisy and dusty jobs and despite a plastic dust screen, and covering some items with dust covers, the dust pretty much got into everything.
After removing the tile, leveling the floors was the next major task. We had chosen solid wood specced at approximately 3/4 inch thick, and wood like this is less tolerant of an uneven base than a laminate or engineered floor would be.
Our quote included 12 bags of cement, with the promise that this was likely a high estimate and we would come in under. As it turned out, we did need less, but not by too much.
Leveling the floors consisted of Paul eyeballing the floor with a steel rule and circling areas where the cement dipped slightly. These were then filled in with fast drying cement with 4 industrial fans running to help in the setting.
Monday night was spent listening to TV over the drone of what sounded like an ATR-42 taxiing in the next room. The chaos was too much for Meredith who checked into Motel 6 until her bed could be reassembled, and enough space found in the living room to actually sit in the sofa.
Another early start, with the main task for the day to double-check the floor surface and lay linoleum in the offices and nursery to be.
On the ground floor, when laying wood floors, a moisture barrier is needed to prevent moisture seeping up through the concrete and causing the wood floor to warp or bend. To ensure a good barrier, the linoleum is glued down and seams are sealed at the joins between separate sheets of lino. Expect this task to add a significant amount to the job quote.
Alternatives to laying linoleum include installing a plywood subfloor, but as you might guess, this can add substantially to the thickness of the floor, creating problems for the transitions to tile, of which we have four, two to bathrooms, and two to the living area of the house.
Another alternative to linoleum is not doing anything at all, and simply gluing the wood directly to the concrete. Paul told me some horror stories, the worst aspect being that a floor that has warped due to moisture coming up through the concrete can not be saved. It must be pulled up, and the job done over again. This was something that we suspected, and very much wanted to avoid.
During Tuesday, the master bedroom floor was also leveled and filled, and the fans moved to help dry the concrete.
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Wednesday was a long day, because now that the linoleum was laid in three of four rooms, the hand-scraped birch wood planks could be laid. For this job, Paul was joined by two additional workers who drove up from the South side of Houston to assist in laying the planks.
For this job, and at my request for a varied look, planks were cut and laid with no particular emphasis on matching colors or wood textures. Because we had chosen wood that varied so much in color and texture, this was probably the only sensible approach.
We decided to run the wood North-South in the offices and nursery, and East-West in the master. This orients the wood towards the windows in all rooms and with one exception allows all the wood planks to run straight into closets.
To ensure the wood stays attached to the floor, special glue is used that needs to be cut, mixed then spread onto the linoleum with a toothed implement. The teeth ensure that an optimal amount of glue is present to enter cut grooves in the wood and hold it securely to the linoleum.
As the planks were laid, clamps were placed against the baseboards to push the floor together and prevent the planks moving apart before the glue cured.
At this stage, walking across the floor feels slightly spongy, but this only lasts until the solvents in the glue evaporate and the glue contracts and 'grabs' the planks downwards into what is hopefully a long-lasting marriage with the lino.
Thursday was a much easier day. We spent the morning moving furniture back in, using the living room as a staging area, and fixing felt pads under all the furniture legs. The clamps holding the floor tight were removed, and some minor bits of dropped glue removed.
Now begins the process of moving 'stuff' back into the rooms, and setting up a nursery, but that's a story for another day.
We were extremely happy that we decided to wood floor all the closets, and also that we decided to remove the tile separating the offices and nursery, and replace it with wood. This ended up giving us a real continuity in the flooring between rooms, and separating the working areas and nursery from the living room and dining kitchen which are tiled.
The glue has done its job and the floor is extremely tight and solid with not a single plank sounding hollow or shaky.
We were and are extremely happy with the job done by Paul and if you drop us a email, we'd be happy to share his contact information.
May 2010 Written by Jonathan