Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum banner

How do you handle transition from hardwood to cut tile with no moulding

56K views 16 replies 8 participants last post by  astor 
#1 ·
Starting a job this morning where the kitchen, foyer & fireplace hearth are tile. I've got 4 transitions to make, plus around the hearth. Tile is layed on 45 degree with cut edges. With backerboard, it's the same height as my flooring.

Customer is adamant they don't want any transitions breaking the tile & hardwood. How do you handle this situation?

My plan, add 1/4 underlayment everywhere the wood is going to build up the hardwood & at every transition, use my fingernail bit on the router & cut a soft transition & cut a rabbit so I can lay the wood up on top of the tile. Nice little upsale on the additional labor to put down the underlayment, but at the same time, kind of a pain not getting to jump right in & start laying floor this morning. Little over 600' total floor.
 
#2 · (Edited)
I do all the time, not a fan of T-mouldings.
Either plane the bottom of the floor boards if the tile level is lower*
or use planed ply to built up if the tiles are higher than flooring.
Once planed, you need to pass the board on a table saw to flash the tongue or groove with the top layer. Or you may need to take off some wood under the tongue in order to fit tight. Depends on the direction of the T&G. All mortifications on the header board, not touching the flooring boards. Keeping all T&G structure.
In this job the tiles are 3/8" higher than the wood floor level, but while walking through is hardly noticeable.

A little matching grout helps. as you can see on third pic, the grout trace, cleaned after.

If the tiles are 1/8" lower then the wood, I rabbit the bottom of the boards with table saw wide as 1/8" and let the wood rest on top of the tile-see the last picture.Tape the tiles,use PL premium adhesive or wood floor adhesive and let it come out between tile and the wood lip,clean with Bostik's wipes, move the tape.
The nosing made of tiles was there, I cut the rectified ceramic tile-was difficult to get a clean cut,so now the wood is 3/32" is higher sitting on the tile with a little less than 1/4" lip. Before tiles were showing when the door was closed, now tiles are at the laundry room only.














 
#6 ·
If the hardwood and tile will be flat to one another, use color matched sealant as described. A movement joint is required here anyway--no matter how you address the transition. I see far too many installations with the two materials either touching or nearly touching. Unless you're installing the hardwoods during the highest humidity season of the year, you're asking for grout failures by not allowing for the movement of the hardwood.

You may have to dress your cuts for a nice clean line.
 
#7 ·
Never had any callback regarding to that..with solid wood it probably will happen, but w/engineered flooring I doubt it, specially I work high end homes where the A/C runs non stop all summer. If I have a matching color caulk, I would use that though.


pinwheel how did you do it?
 
#12 · (Edited)
pinwheel how did you do it?
I don't think I made myself fully clear. The tile is not clean enough to just butt wood up against & apply color match caulk. My SOP is pretty much like your astor, head board & color match caulk.

I'll take some pics tomorrow. I raised the entire subfloor by 1/4" so I could cut a rabbit on my head boards. Headed to the shop in just a few to make the heads. I'll use a fingernail bit on the router to make a nice soft long radius & cut a rabbit on the bottom so it sets up ontop of the tile, like a saddle would.
 
#8 ·
Very nice transitions Astor!:notworthy.. I too , am not and hate transitions , tile to wood. When installing tile and wood in the same house , tile first . I use a piece of the wood to be installed at doors and install my new tile floor right up to it , when I'm done with the dirty tile work i attack the wood floor. it ALWAYS matches up .
 

Attachments

#11 ·
Nice trans astor that is definitely the way to go with the caulk as well.Seen to many grout jobs crack and ruin the floor. Most people dont want the header but don't understand the other methods are extremely time consuming and costly to them. I have done many transitions and I personally hate the looks of saddles and t mold etc. Nice flowing floors give it more elegance
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top