Hi all, could somebody tell me what is the minimum thickness of plywood you need to put over existing chipboard floor before you can nail down 18mm solid oak flooring? thanks again
Thanks lads, I'm trying to keep the price down and convince the customer that plywood has to go down first. Thing is, she has the same flooring in her lounge and the previous fitter has nailed it direct to the chipboard. It's been down three years and no sign of any problems.
Yeah lucky, that's the problem. she thinks I'm trying to add extra unnecessary work. If she doesn't take the advice I'll show her this thread.
thats the problem we face a lot in this trade Mr cowboy lashes it down half a$$ed Gets Extremely lucky and gets away with it We come along and spec the job correctly and because we add the correct materials/prep etc, it looks like were trying to rob the customer grrrr Tw@ts
if you've got a copy of BS you could always show her that if memory serves me right they do say to ply chipboard minimum 4mm anyway.
The shop I use to work for would nail direct to chipboard and to be fair no comebacks as far as I know? Not something I would do now though. If you gotta ply it you may aswell stick it down?
its a 50/50 chance. Either it will be o.k or it will go wrong. A lot has to do with humidity conditions. We have had a high humidity spell of late and i can tell you all now, the phone has been ringing every few minutes regarding failed floors . Last few months have killed off a lot of the 'lucky' floors A lot of people dont understand when we advice 'use this and do this' we are allowing a safe guard to protect 'what may happen' The reason for the 'safe guard' is so when the climate does daft stuff your covered. So many installers skimp and get away with it as the property they installed in has a very balanced atmosphere. Its when something happens to that balanced atmosphere that you will soon get a problem.
Yeah what I mean is, they may get away with it but i wouldn't take the risk. Unfortunately there are a lot of customers out there that would rather take the risk.
