How many square feet can one "float" flooring?

[jerseygli]

I have about a 650 square foot area (on slab) that we are planning to install some engineered flooring. It is tongue and groove style vs click lock, so I realize that we will have to glue the boards together.

I want to float the whole floor vs glue to the slab, but I remember hearing somewhere that you can only "safely" float about 400 square feet without any kind of glued down transition. TIA for any advice!

[barry2952]

In for an answer. Probably has to do with expansion and contraction.

[jerseygli]

Barry, I figured you would have had the answer!

[Mk1Racer]

Check w/ the mfg. of the floating floor that you're going to use, I'm sure they have that kind of information.

[barry2952]

Barry, I figured you would have had the answer!

Actually, the only time I've used an engineered wood product was to line the cabin of my toy hauler in bamboo. I would never use bamboo for a real floor, though. Found it very easy to damage.

[Papa Dras]

Not floated, but we installed 1300sg ft of carbonized strand bamboo and it is invincible...which is a good thing, because you can see the few scratches due to the darker color. It took over a month to acclimate to our house because it's so dense.

[jerseygli]

Lurking around on a few diy boards has yielded some folks talking about floating large square footage areas (600-1100) but no one ever mentions glue down transitions aside from carpet reducers, etc. I'm leaning toward it's ok, but still on the fence.

Also, called the manufacturer and they were closed for the night. Will try tomorrow.

[katc]

I floated over 1200 sq ft of click-lock flooring over a slab. Spans 6 rooms - figured I could always cut it at the entrance to each room later and install a transition if there ever was a problem, but in over 7 years I haven't had any issues.

[jerseygli]

That is the kind of experience I was looking for! I'm going to go for it. Thx!

[ordpetegti]

Not as big as some of the other jobs, but I did a click and lock install with a few glued seams near the walls and tight spots. The room was 26 feet by 12 feet. No problems yet. It has been 6 months.

[barry2952]

Whatever you do, leave a substantial gap around the perimeter for expansion. I would even raise the base molding so that the floor could expand underneath it if necessary. Don't secure it to the sub-floor anywhere. Don't put anything super heavy, like a piano on the floor as the weight will keep the floor from moving and could bunch up on both sides in a high-humidity situation, if that applies.

[jerseygli]

Heaviest thing going on the floor is a couch.

I was reading all about expansion last night. 1/2" - 3/8" is the general consensus for perimeter gaps on a floating engineered. The plan was to take the baseboards off for the install (vs adding a shoe molding). Then either reinstall the original baseboards, provided I can remove them without utter destruction, or install new, larger baseboards.

[barry2952]

Just remember that the expansion is directly proportional to the number of seams, so you might want to consider installing the flooring along the longer of the sides of the room. End to end expansion is less than side to side, I believe.

[jerseygli]

Good advice from all!

[Papa Dras]

I'd also make sure that if this is going on a sub grade slab, that you look into a moisture barrier. I've seen a few floors that had moisture come up from underneath and it curls all the edges and is almost unrepairable.

[barry2952]

You make a very good point. However, all that moisture under the vapor barrier can easily cause mold to form. Concrete wicks moisture from below all the time. We resolved this issue by installing a vapor barrier under the insulation that we poured the concrete floor on top of.

Prove it to yourself with a 10 x 10 plastic tarp on your garage floor. In most parts of the country moisture will form overnight.

This is truly one of those damned if you do and damned if you don't situation.

[jerseygli]

I haz no basement

The install will be above grade, whole house is on a slab. This is going in the living room, hallway and kitchen.

[barry2952]

I haz no basement

The install will be above grade, whole house is on a slab. This is going in the living room, hallway and kitchen.

I would check with the manufacturer on the vapor barrier issue. If it's a laminate I doubt it would warp. If it's engineered wood, it could. There may be warranty issues, so it's best to check.

[jerseygli]

It's engineered. Plan (generally) is:

Remove baseboard and current flooring
Clean subfloor & check for level and moisture content (slab)
Lay down moisture barrier/underlayment padding (still have to pick that product out)
Install flooring as a floating installation (glue in the tongue and groove); with 1/2" - 3/8" expansion gap around perimeter
Replace baseboards and install transition pieces

Thinking to treat the kitchen and the living room as two separate projects and work them start to finish since this will be a weekend thing and I don't want to walk around in a construction zone if the weekends available aren't concurrent. Living room is currently carpeted, kitchen has some gross Pergo laminate.

Sounds easy right?

[Papa Dras]

Sounds easy right?

yeah, just like all house projects. no gotchas anywhere...

[jerseygli]

yeah, just like all house projects. no gotchas anywhere...

According to HGTV it should only take about 30 minutes

[FlashRedGLS1.8T]

According to HGTV it should only take about 30 minutes

I expect a "Everything went worse than expected" post but hope it's the opposite.

Fun project.

[Mk3WhiteWolf]

In for results as well. I have about 900 square feet of flooring to do between three adjacent rooms. We want to do it in a higher grade laminate, but also looking at some floatable engineered wood (High humidity region.)

[jerseygli]

So I'm thinking THIS for the underlayment. Anyone have opinions/experiences/cautions?

[jerseygli]

According to HGTV it should only take about 30 minutes

Well, it's done (was done in July). Took longer than 30 minutes - 2 full weekends to be specific with some serious friend help.

Removed all the baseboards for the install. Ruined a couple on removal so we have to recut. But, it made for a nice finish. Floor went down pretty nicely. We floated everything, but there is a low transition piece in between the kitchen/dining (300 sq ft) and the living room/hall (~350 sq ft).

I'm much happier with this than carpet all over the place. Dog is sliding all over the place and less enamored than me, but it's hilarious.

[Gale__]

Any pics of your baseboards? Are you getting any gaps? I'm about to dive in to the same situation (floating engineered on a slab).

[jerseygli]

Not really gapping, we ended up using quarter round so we could put the baseboards back in their original location. To get the baseboards to sit flush with the floor we would have had to nail them back lower on the wall. Then I would have had to paint all the walls around the trim again and I didn't want to go there. House was built in early 1960's so there has certainly be some settling over time.

Surprisingly, I really like the quarter round as a finished product. I usually don't like it. We puttied the nail holes, the top of the baseboard to the wall and the seam between the quarter round and the baseboard.

Hall pic (this is probably the largest gap I see over everything):

[drhavoc]

I covered 1500 sqft of my house in Floating floor, when we moved into the house is was carpet over particle board i didn't have the money for a new Subfloor so the next logical thing to do was a Floating floor. picked up 2000 sqft for 1.20 a sqft and spend 3 weeks of evenings and weekends putting the floor in.

Its been 2 years now no buckling anywhere. I made sure i left enough of a gap for the walls which i'm going to be covering up with baseboard.

these days true hardwood (Pine is not hardwood) is horribly expensive, this had the look and feel of walnut at 1/10th the cost.

from this


to this

[firefighterjunkie]

Not really gapping, we ended up using quarter round so we could put the baseboards back in their original location. To get the baseboards to sit flush with the floor we would have had to nail them back lower on the wall. Then I would have had to paint all the walls around the trim again and I didn't want to go there. House was built in early 1960's so there has certainly be some settling over time.

Surprisingly, I really like the quarter round as a finished product. I usually don't like it. We puttied the nail holes, the top of the baseboard to the wall and the seam between the quarter round and the baseboard.

Hall pic (this is probably the largest gap I see over everything):

What brand and color is that flooring? Looks nice.

[jerseygli]

Thank you, it has lots of really cool color variations that aren't completely represented in that picture. It is Home Depot brand Home Legend Distressed Kinsley Hickory.

Here is link.