New Wood Floors

[Go Coogs']

I installed some handscraped hickory engineered wood floors in my house this past week. Still have some caulking and touch up painting to do, but I'm nearly finished.

Carpet Removal



Ceramic Tile was a bitch to demo


Begin Install




Coat Closet and entry to bedroom



Living Room


Baseboards painted and drying


Hallway to guest rooms


Last wood plank going in...


The dining room


Molding


Me, my stepdad, and mvscal

[Mace]

Looks good, Coogs. Nice domicile.

[Ken]

Well done... Looks great. Obligatory... Hope your floor joists are on 6" centers.

[smackaholic]

Nice job, rumps. I hope you tipped mvscal well.

What is the subfloor? Is it a slab? Looked like it in one of the first pics. It it is, what is with the air gun? You can't nail that shit into concrete. Or is that some other type of peee-new-matic gizmo. Perhaps Mrs Rumps vibrator?

[Screw_Michigan]

E-fucking-nuff with the home renovation threads.

[Dr_Phibes]

Never been a fan of pre-finished, it has a plastic look/feel. The windows look White Rose 'frilly', why did you put all that back when you where done? Nice trim upgrade though, it's the highlight of your Victorian charade.

[Wolfman]

Nice work--always have to give props to a fellow "this olde shack" DIY guy.

[ChargerMike]

that's you in the middle..right?

[Van]

Thank you for not including any ass shots of your wife.

[smackaholic]

the interwebs doesn't have enough pixels for that shot.

[kcdave]

Good on you Coogs. We are getting new wood and carpet.
No way in hell I was doing it myself. Wood guys will finish tomorrow morning,
and then the carpet guys come.

[Dr_Phibes]

Either you guys are very, very short. Or your ceilings are higher than mine.

Four inch baseboard with nine foot ceilings throws you off. It's like looking at a splinter pattern on a battleship, it confuses your sense of perception.

[smackaholic]

nahh, I just think they're midgets.

[smackaholic]

I'll bet TiVO has a place with 5 ft ceilings and 1 inch baseboard.

[Left Seater]

For sure it is a slab foundation. Floor is floating I'm sure. That allows for it to move some in the 95% humidity of August and the 20% humidity of a January cold front.

The nail gun would be for the baseboards, no?

Ceiling height is just higher in Texas than anywhere else the Seater's have lived. Prolly has to do with the extremely low cost to build here.

Screw, I bet the apt folks would let you paint a wall or something. Just make sure you run the new colors by Dr_Phibes in advance.

Rack the new floors Coogs.

[smackaholic]

Ceiling height is just higher in Texas than anywhere else the Seater's have lived. Prolly has to do with the extremely low cost to build here.

Prolly has to do with it being an old house from the days before 4x8 sheetrock and precut studs, At that time there really wasn't much of a price premium to go with 9 or even 10 ft ceilings. You see it a lot in New England as well in old houses. That house with it's T&G pine board sheathing is likely pre-1960.

Today building a house with 9 ft walls vice 8 is a fair bit costlier as you need to run an extra course of sheet rock and you can't build the walls out of pre-cut studs.

Of course more folks in teeehas are likely to go to that expense so your ten gallon hats you fukks where everywhere Don't on the ceiling.

[Dr_Phibes]

Not anymore, 9' ceilings are the industry norm for main floor on condos, subdivisions - 54" drywall is manufactured specifically for that. 10' is custom homes and calls back to Victorian rowhousing, they couldn't build out so they built up. You'd hang your pictures up relatively near the ceiling.

Spring is coming and it's the middle class mating season. It's important that everyone gets their plumage in order - you don't want the Jones laughing behind your back when you top up the Chateau Ripple.

[R-Jack]

E-fucking-nuff with the home renovation threads.

I'm going to end up spending a shitload on mine. Nothing was changed in the house except about removing 130lbs of trash, but the results are fantastic

[Y2K]

E-fucking-nuff with the home renovation threads.

I'm going to end up spending a shitload on mine. Nothing was changed in the house except about removing 130lbs of trash, but the results are fantastic

Rack it!

[smackaholic]

Not anymore, 9' ceilings are the industry norm for main floor on condos, subdivisions - 54" drywall is manufactured specifically for that. 10' is custom homes and calls back to Victorian rowhousing, they couldn't build out so they built up. You'd hang your pictures up relatively near the ceiling.

Spring is coming and it's the middle class mating season. It's important that everyone gets their plumage in order - you don't want the Jones laughing behind your back when you top up the Chateau Ripple.

wasn't aware of the 54" drywall. haven't seen it in HD yet, but then, i don't suppose condo contractors shop there.

[Carson]

You may have to go to a drywall supply house to find the 54 inch "stretch" drywall.

It won't lay flat in a standard pickup truck bed.

Have fun picking up those heavy-ass sheets.

[smackaholic]

Yeah, I'll bet hanging 54" 12 footers on a ceiling is a blast. I remember the first time I helped a friend hang that shit in his garage. A few years later, he told me about a dude he worked with who was building a house. He hired a messican sheetrock hanger who could hang 12 ft pieces on the ceiling by himself and he didn't have one of those crank up holder deals. I prolly wouldn't want to fukk with that dude.

[H4ever]

Rack the floors...the look good. But, does "engineered" mean laminate? When you say "hand-scraped" they must have a hickory veneer then? Not to go all Dins here, but would you be able to sand and refinish them in the future or would you have to tear them out and start over? That floor doesn't look cheap by no means, but I think solid wood flooring is a better choice and prob comparably priced.

Our house was built in 1927 and has the high ceilings. While removing carpeting to install new, we discovered solid oak floors throughout including the open staircase which was oak as well. Sand and refinished it all and it turned out spectacular. The beauty of those floors is they were installed in 1927 so the quality is unbelievable and they can be sanded and refinished countless times.

[smackaholic]

Can't put solid wood directly on a slab. You would need to build up some sort of wood subfloor. Of course with his 47 ft ceilings, coogs has the headroom to spare.

And, yes, engineered does mean laminate. Some of the thicker grades of laminate may have enough material to refinish once.

[Dr_Phibes]

Tapcon plywood to the concrete, the job would have been done. I'm assuming Coogs' doesn't have in-floor heating, I don't understand why he cheaped out.

Sand off the finish and re-urethane, it's traditional hardwood floor. It's done when sub-trades beat the shit out of it or a poor install. Coogs went thin here, so he's in trouble when someone with heels goes for a walk.

[H4ever]

Can't put solid wood directly on a slab. You would need to build up some sort of wood subfloor. Of course with his 47 ft ceilings, coogs has the headroom to spare.

And, yes, engineered does mean laminate. Some of the thicker grades of laminate may have enough material to refinish once.

I see what your saying. I have heard of sub-flooring that are wooden squares with dimples on the bottom or something. Made for basements and slab floors. I'm thinking those could be utilized in Coog's house to allow for solid wood flooring. Albeit, prob add quite a bit to the expense.

[Go Coogs']

Engineered is not laminate. Laminate is a photo on top of manufactured wood. Engineered is an actual thin layer of hickory (in this case anyways) 3/8" to a have inch thick placed on thin layers of plywood. This wood has a 25 year warranty and can be refinished once. Of course, you lose some of the definition of the hand scraped feature once refinished, but you will still be able to see a ripple in the design.

Real hardwood floors are not a good idea in southeast Texas because of the humidity and extreme heat during the summer. Most everyone here either goes with laminate or engineered hardwood. Engineered is definitely an upgrade over laminate and carpet and has the look of genuine hardwood because it is genuine, just thin.

My ceilings are 10ft I think, cus I am 6'5" tall and have to jump to reach the ceiling.

[Go Coogs']

Also, house was built in 2004. You won't find a ceiling less than 10ft high on a house built after 2000.

[smackaholic]

Engineered is so laminate by definition. What you are talking about is the difference between good laminate and 29 cent a sq ft shit you get at big lots. I agree that in the semi-tropical hellhole you live in, good lami....engineered wood is the way to go.

Phibes, why in the fukk would you do infloor radiant heat in houston? It may work just fine in your fukking Igloo or beaver lodge or whatever the fukk it is you upper messicans call home, but not down there where a really big forced air hvAC system is called for. And yes, I capitalized the AC part for a reason.

[Go Coogs']

Laminate and engineered are not the same. The price difference and warranty should clue you in and you can't refinish a picture of wood. Engineered hardwood is real wood and it looks a lot better than laminate.

[smackaholic]

Went and looked it up and I am afraid you are right, in a marketing sense anyhoo. "engineered wood" and "laminate" are different in that the engineered wood does have a thin slice of real wood on the surface and laminates have, well, something else. Engineered wood, is however, technically a laminate in that it is constructed using the laminating process.

[Go Coogs']

From a marketing sense? Uhm...no. It's simple, aholic, one is real and the other is fake. Laminate adds very little value when upgrading from carpet whereas engineered hardwood adds substantial value to a home.

My realtor friend said the best way to sell a home quick (other than location) is granite in the kitchen, hardwood floors, and storage. I will have all the by next week. In addition, I'm extending my patio with pavers by the end of the month and I am doing a modest upgrade to the master bath with fresh paint, new fixtures, framed mirrors, and new glass and trim on the shower.

[Shlomart Ben Yisrael]

...I'm extending my patio with pavers...

There were some left over from your tool shed "project"? Awesome.

[Mace]

Engineered wood? I guess when I get wood it's called chemical engineering.

[smackaholic]

Engineered wood? I guess when I get wood it's called chemical engineering.

At your age, it's called a miracle.

[Left Seater]

Smack,

The stuff Coogs put down is pretty much a necessity where he lives. We don't do basements in Texas due to the high level of the water table along the coast and the solid rock found about 125 miles inland. We mostly use pier and slab foundations as well along the coast since a crawl space under a house in the Houston area is pretty much mold city. So wood floors need to float and the engineered products do that very well while protecting the actual hardwood from any moisture that might wick up thru the foundation.

[smackaholic]

His choice is definitely the way to go in the capital of hot/humid, but, I think it is the plastic sheet which keeps the moisture at bay. Another reason for not building a basement is why bother. there is not frost line to dig under. pretty much level the surface and pour a slab.