Laminate Flooring

razzy3

We are installing an Armstrong floating floor in new construction. We are at the wall and need to install around the bottom step. Are there any tricks to locking inplace? Also, how about door jams. It is very difficult to get the last piece in tight. Do we need to cut the lip?

Please help.

JonM

Lock the last piece into the second to last piece first....that will allow you enough height to lock them both in at one shot.

Don't forget the expansion 1/4" against the wall.

PrecisionFloors

You are a "flooring contractor" and don't know these very simple things about a laminate floor installation??

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JamesNLA

he is not a contractor. He is a DIY with his Lowes flooring. Who the hell does laminent in NC?

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Bodger

Unfortunately, that's exactly what is going on the floors at my current new construction project. 2500 square feet of woven strand bamboo engineered flooring. The archy had originally specifed a laminated bamboo floor product called Gammapar. I had four flooring contractors come to the site to give me a bid and all four passed on the work immediately because the flooring has to go over a Warmboard radiant heat floor, and the archy had specified that all of the thresholds be set so that the flooring was nearly flush to the top of the thresholds, and the necessary 1/4" expansion gap be fillied with a reveal grade cork sliver. If you're not familiar with that Warmboard product, it is a 1 1/8" subfloor with grooves pre-routed into it to accept the hot water tubing. The top of the plywood is covered with a sheet metal skin that is also pressed into the routed grooves. It turned out that Gammapar does not warranty any of its bamboo flooring over radiant heat floors. I eventually found a bamboo product that was backed with a warranty over radiant heat, and a flooring contractor that had experience with gluing it directly to Warmboard and was also willing to warranty his work in writing. I don't like the laminated stuff so much, it all looks like cheap Pergo to me, and I hate the pad option that is under under some engineered laminated hardwood flooring. Too much flex for me. Matter of taste I suppose.

Floordude

I have had to rewrite architects specs, more than once!!!! Flooring manufacturer specs over rule architects every time!! Sometimes you have to be the educator to get the job, and sometimes they think they know more than you and you have to walk away..

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Bodger

Yeah, this architect is one of those guys who has attended some high tone eastern colleges, got his masters, and thinks he knows everything but has no practical field experience. Every time I tell him to show me where he's done a hinky detail before and how it has held up, he doesn't have an answer. I can't believe these homeowners haven't fired him. I've suggested it more than once.

MakDeco

I think the OP is talking about actual Laminate flooring (like formica tops) Bodger are you talking about a floor that is real wood top layer that is engineered in small laminated sections??

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Bodger

Yes, I think I have my laminates mixed up with my engineered and so forth. Most of what I have had installed on my jobs has been good old solid wood, select oak, maple, like that. What's going into my current job is woven strand bamboo engineered flooring. I guess that differs from the Pergo, which isn't real wood?
We've gone round and round with the flooring issue on this job. 5/8" thick versus 3/8". floating on a pad as opposed to gluing directly to the Warmboard, skimmimg with Ardex first and then gluing directly to that. who will and won't warranty, and on and on. One of the things I think I don't like about engineered flooring is that once it's on, that's it, any other work that has to be done in the house beter damn sure not damage the floors.

MakDeco

Correct Pergo type flooring is plastic which hold up well in certain situations and today's laminates are certainly better then years ago.. I have seen them even texture now to give a better appearance of being wood.

There is solid bamboo out there but some of it is engineered I have been looking into bamboo for my floor in my office but have not made up my mind yet.

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Bodger

This is my first experience with bamboo. What we are using is woven strand, and all the laminates are also bamboo, as opposed to other engineered woods which as I understand have a top layer laminate of the desired hardwood, and then layers of ply. Apparently this can't be done with bamboo, or at least isn't done, due to the moisture charactersitics of bamboo. It's eiher all bamboo or there could be problems. Still engineered and still laminated, but all bamboo. I could be wrong about all of this though, I have never seen such confusion and contradiction on one flooring job as I have seen on my current project. The Warmboard radiant heat floor didn't help either, it's apparently not that common out here and four flooring contractors in a row came out and said "What the f**k is that sub floor!!?"

MakDeco

Pic isn't great but here is a engineered bamboo top layer bamboo bottom layers ply...

Pic from phone camera..

Attached Thumbnails

 

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Bodger

It's absolutely amazing how much conflicting info there is out there. Gammapar flooring (a manufacturer) and another manuf. told me that what is clearly shown in your picture is never done due to moisture characteristics of bamboo. I guess they are trying to cite their method as an industry standard to increase sales.

MakDeco

I was told that form of bamboo was allow in basments because it was not solid...

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Bodger

What I was hearing was probably that although it was available, bamboo with ply laminates was not a good idea to put over a radiant heat floor due to moisture concerns. It was hard as hell to find a flooring manuf. that would warranty their product over Warmboard radiant heat, that much was certain.

MakDeco

I don' think this manuf would warranty it over radiant floors either...

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Bodger

I'm not a huge fan of radiant heat floors for use out here in Southern Cal. Seems like a lot of time and trouble and expense to install it everywhere in a 3000 square foot house. Tiled bathroom floors maybe, but not through the whole house. And this house, custom as it is, has no other HVAC. No A/C, no air exchange, no ductwork or FAU whatsoever. Opening the fancy electrically controlled windows is he only ventilation that will be available.
Back east, cold winters, that would be different. I grew up in eastern Ohio in anouse that was built in 1890 and had one floor furnace to heat the entire house. I will never forget my feet hitting that cold linoleum floor in my bedroom on a frosty morning. I can remember going to bed some nights and I could actually see my breath in my bedroom, it was that chilly in there. I always understood why they used bedwarmers in te ld days, although I never had one. Should have used my mom's iron.
Jerez, am I off topic enough at this point?

jamestrd

you can put bamboo over radiant...but in all applications i have done, manufacturer alwasy recommended floating it..

just get titebond T& G adhesive and glue together over 3 in 1 padding...

that said, if manufacturer wont warrant it and is not recommended, then do NOT do it..

Use vertical grain bamboo...all bamboo products i have seen are layered in 3 applications, all bamboo. this because of the natural thickness of bamboo, that a solid 3/4 can not be naturally milled.

JamesNLA

That's crazy. While the house is close to the water, it still gets pretty hot around there. Same with the cold. AC, I can understand, but no furnace? Radient floor is not going to heat a spacious home. All that money on a new build and they gotta walk around with blankets and sweaters on.

If I were you, I'd start planning on how to get HVAC in there after your archi is gone. Take lots of pics

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Bodger

You're right James. This archy, as I have stated in previous posts, is nothing short of a damned criminal as far as I'm concerned. He convinced the homeowners that the Warmboard radiant heat was all they needed, and a gas fireplace in the living room, which had to be moved from its original center of room proposed location where the HO's wanted it, to an exterior wall because this numbnuts archy couldn't vent it otherwise. he even tried to sell them on an ethanol F/P with a tank that had to be filled with bottles and crap like that. My original advice to the HO's was to use the mini-duct system for full HVAC and forget the radiant heat unless they wanted it on the tiled bath floors. No go, archy-boy overrode me. There was absolutely no room in the framing for standard HVAC ducting. There is $60,000 in structural steel in that house. Moment frames, tube steel, you name it, and this guy didn't want any soffits for mechanicals. One of the things I tried to point out to the HO's is that we have many a morning in LA, where it may be 60 degrees and they'll want that floor heated up. But within a couple of hours, even near to the beach, the temp can get higher and there is no need for the heat at all. As I understand it, the Warmboard stays warm and radiates heat for some time even after it's been shut down. So with no A/C, all you can do is open windows. If I was spending a million bucks for a new house, and had to deal with that horses**t, I think I'd be pissed. But I've warned them and covered my butt in writing the whole way along.