Alternative to wood flooring

suds said:
Any source for the cork floors? 

A quick internet search shows that cork plank flooring is even available at the big box stores.  You might want to check your Olympia Lowes store.

Peter
 
You are in the NW? I just purchased and installed cork flooring from Kentwood brand. They have a distributor in Seattle but you can see samples at many local stores.

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jacko9 said:
Sparktrician said:
Even the plywood subfloor under the carpeted areas of my house squeaks.  Eventually, I'll replace the carpet with 3/4" t&g red oak, but first, I'm going to have to screw down the subflooring or use ring-shank nails as well as pull any loose original nails I can get to, then cover the subfloor with rosin paper before laying the red oak.  The squeaking drives me up a wall.  I agree with others that particle board is a source of heartache.  I'm ever so grateful that it was not used in my house. 

Before you go through all of that, make sure that you understand the structure of your floor.  Here in California, a lot of homes were built with a 4 x 6 on 4' centers and then covered with 1 1/8" t&g plywood.  No amount of nailing will eliminate the deflection in the center of that span with resulting squeaks.

I live in San Diego CA with a home built as described...a Giant box of screws and about 3 hours of screwing and I've managed to remove every single squeak in my home, its no longer `haunted`

Christopher
 
Christopher Robinson said:
jacko9 said:
Sparktrician said:
Even the plywood subfloor under the carpeted areas of my house squeaks.  Eventually, I'll replace the carpet with 3/4" t&g red oak, but first, I'm going to have to screw down the subflooring or use ring-shank nails as well as pull any loose original nails I can get to, then cover the subfloor with rosin paper before laying the red oak.  The squeaking drives me up a wall.  I agree with others that particle board is a source of heartache.  I'm ever so grateful that it was not used in my house. 

Before you go through all of that, make sure that you understand the structure of your floor.  Here in California, a lot of homes were built with a 4 x 6 on 4' centers and then covered with 1 1/8" t&g plywood.  No amount of nailing will eliminate the deflection in the center of that span with resulting squeaks.

I live in San Diego CA with a home built as described...a Giant box of screws and about 3 hours of screwing and I've managed to remove every single squeak in my home, its no longer `haunted`

Christopher

Christopher,

I glad that the screws fixed your squeaking floor but, I still maintain that a 4' span will create some flooring issues over time.  I have been in my house for over 40 years and even though I used ring shank nails with a 6" spacing to fasten the ply to the floor beams,  I have deflections in mid span that caused cracks in my kitchen Travertine stone floor tiles.  I also added 2 x 6 supports at mid span where I installed my t&g oak flooring and with the 30# building felt I don't have squeaking floors.

Jack
 
jacko9 said:
Christopher Robinson said:
jacko9 said:
Sparktrician said:
Even the plywood subfloor under the carpeted areas of my house squeaks.  Eventually, I'll replace the carpet with 3/4" t&g red oak, but first, I'm going to have to screw down the subflooring or use ring-shank nails as well as pull any loose original nails I can get to, then cover the subfloor with rosin paper before laying the red oak.  The squeaking drives me up a wall.  I agree with others that particle board is a source of heartache.  I'm ever so grateful that it was not used in my house. 

Before you go through all of that, make sure that you understand the structure of your floor.  Here in California, a lot of homes were built with a 4 x 6 on 4' centers and then covered with 1 1/8" t&g plywood.  No amount of nailing will eliminate the deflection in the center of that span with resulting squeaks.

I live in San Diego CA with a home built as described...a Giant box of screws and about 3 hours of screwing and I've managed to remove every single squeak in my home, its no longer `haunted`

Christopher

Christopher,

I glad that the screws fixed your squeaking floor but, I still maintain that a 4' span will create some flooring issues over time.  I have been in my house for over 40 years and even though I used ring shank nails with a 6" spacing to fasten the ply to the floor beams,  I have deflections in mid span that caused cracks in my kitchen Travertine stone floor tiles.  I also added 2 x 6 supports at mid span where I installed my t&g oak flooring and with the 30# building felt I don't have squeaking floors.

Jack

Your daft for even trying travatine on a floor like that. Of cause it is going to crack
 
Deansocial said:
jacko9 said:
Christopher Robinson said:
jacko9 said:
Sparktrician said:
Even the plywood subfloor under the carpeted areas of my house squeaks.  Eventually, I'll replace the carpet with 3/4" t&g red oak, but first, I'm going to have to screw down the subflooring or use ring-shank nails as well as pull any loose original nails I can get to, then cover the subfloor with rosin paper before laying the red oak.  The squeaking drives me up a wall.  I agree with others that particle board is a source of heartache.  I'm ever so grateful that it was not used in my house. 

Before you go through all of that, make sure that you understand the structure of your floor.  Here in California, a lot of homes were built with a 4 x 6 on 4' centers and then covered with 1 1/8" t&g plywood.  No amount of nailing will eliminate the deflection in the center of that span with resulting squeaks.

I live in San Diego CA with a home built as described...a Giant box of screws and about 3 hours of screwing and I've managed to remove every single squeak in my home, its no longer `haunted`

Christopher

Christopher,

I glad that the screws fixed your squeaking floor but, I still maintain that a 4' span will create some flooring issues over time.  I have been in my house for over 40 years and even though I used ring shank nails with a 6" spacing to fasten the ply to the floor beams,  I have deflections in mid span that caused cracks in my kitchen Travertine stone floor tiles.  I also added 2 x 6 supports at mid span where I installed my t&g oak flooring and with the 30# building felt I don't have squeaking floors.

Jack

Your daft for even trying travatine on a floor like that. Of cause it is going to crack

Ditto
Tinker
 
If you are going to lay a wood floor (3/4" solid) then the particle board will need to be removed. It should have been installed over the sub floor to stiffen it when they were going to install something other than solid 3/4" wood. If you don't remove it you will have problems with height and squeaking (particle board will not hold a nail).
 
Well, the weather is great now so we talked to the flooring guy late this spring and decided that while we liked the idea of extra "squeak security" it just was going to be too much of a mess to take on.  I'm sure it has save me a lot of dough!!!
 
If new plywood is out of the question, the I would simply staple -and- glue the floor to the particle board.  Something like PL400 should work just fine.  However, before doing so, if the subfloor is already squeaky, the before putting down the wood, I would re-fasten that particle board to the framing with high quality screws.
 
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