Poll: Flooring Advice please! Home owners or contractors, over here!

[Tiger]

A thread just for me.

If your planning on using Vinyl tile, DON'T. The problem with Vinyl tile is that you have a seam in the surface every 9 or 12 inches. Water will get into and under those seams and the tile will curl up. Sheet vinyl flooring is another alternative if the install can be seamless, but is way above the heads of most DIY's

If your going to do ceramic tile in the bathroom you need to make sure that the subfloor is at least 3/4" thick and stiff. Any flex in the subfloor will lead to cracked grout joints and possible broken tile. Rent a diamond blade tub saw to cut the tile. Buy a cheap plastic notched trowel who's nothches match the height of the tile your installing. Don't use synthetic mastics to adhear the tile, you need to use Thinset, a portland cement product.

As for carpet, most re-stretches are caused by pad failure. The pad looses it's density over time and the traffic on the carpet stretches it in place, giving you the lumps. Spend the money on top of the line pad. Even inexpensive carpet can last a long time with good pad underneath. Installing carpet is not a job recommended for first time DIY's.

 

[Aceman]

jonnyGURU,
I purchased a house 18 months ago that sounds like the condition yours is in. Your rooms are small enough that if you went with foam backed carpet and bought a home improvement book, you could easily save money by watching the carpet prices at home improvement stores. I've slowly redone 1/3 of the floors in my house. I have two young boys that are holy terrors and their rooms are last! Ceramic tiling is a long and tedious job. I went with 12x12 stick tiles for my bathroom and have yet to see any problems. Besides, in my small bathroom, it was cheaper to go with a closeout stick tile at $50/tile that took me about 4 hours from start to finnish than it was to ceramic tile the floor @ 4 times the time and 4 times the cost.

Best of luck to you!

 

[jonnyGURU]

Thanks, Tiger. Fact is, in Florida nearly all floors in regular homes (gotta leave out the pre-mans) are concrete underneath (no basements) and not wood (unless you're in a flood area and have an elevated house, of course). So the subfloor issue is not a problem. DIY on the carpet was not in the plans, but you've got a good point. A pro can come in and replace the pad and easily reuse the carpet saving me beaucoup bucks. I LIKE THE CARPET in the bedrooms. It's just wrinkled.

Aceman: Small? Man. Living Florida's cracker box houses has spoiled me. This place is huge compared to most.

 

[Aceman]

jonnyGuru,
What I was trying to get across was the fact that most carpet comes in 12' wide rolls, so seaming is not an issue with those rooms. I have a bedroom that is 13.5' X 18' No other way than to seam carpet up there. (The room remains tiled until I can come up with the bucks to redo it. I too like my huge home after living in tiny rental houses with 3 kids. Going from 1300sq ft to 1600 square ft to now 2600 square feet is great!

 

[Tiger]

Your right JG,

Living in Florida eliminates the wood subfloor. I used to live there when I was a kid, Merritt Island, and we had Terrazzo floors with carpet in the bedrooms. The secret to a good tile job is preperation. Make sure the floor is clean, no dust. Snap perpendicular chalk lines on the floor. Lay out the tile before putting down any thinset to make sure that any partial tile are around the perimeter of the room. A ceramic floor is a bigger investment in time, but when you do it right it's a floor that will outlive most owners.

 

[lowtech1]

>>>I LIKE THE CARPET in the bedrooms. It's just wrinkled.<<<

You can get a utility knife &amp; rent a carpet kicker for $15.00 and re-stretch your carpet in 10 minutes.


>>> If your planning on using Vinyl tile, DON'T. The problem with Vinyl tile is that you have a seam in the surface every 9 or 12 inches. Water will get into and under those seams and the tile will curl up.<<<

Not a problem, because 6~7 coats of sealant will last you more than 5 years, and you can wash the floor and reapply more sealant coating at any time you want. (It is just as easy as moping the floor and reapply 1-to-2 coats of sealant every year for longevity...could get your to last to 25 years or longer)


>>>Sheet vinyl flooring is another alternative if the install can be seamless, but is way above the heads of most DIY's<<<

Not a hard task if you don?t mind a 6~8in seam at the back of your toilet. Or, you can add an extra 1~1.5 hour for remove &amp; reset the toilet bowl.


Tile floor last longer than vinyl, but you really have to take care of it...at least once a year you have to reseal it, or the water will get under it and pop the tiles up.

 

[jonnyGURU]

Yeah Lowtech, I could do that but what if the problem IS the pad?

 

[lowtech1]

>>>I could do that but what if the problem IS the pad?<<<

If your carpet is not too old then the problem could be from the poor initial installation job. You could check to see if the underlay is damage by lifting the carpet &amp; roll it back for a visual inspection at the existing wrinkles. If the problem is from damage pad, then you have to replace the underlay and re-carpet the room (you can re-use the carpet if it is still good). Remember to stretch/mount the carpet from the middle of the carpet to the corner, to avoid wrinkles.

Cause for winked carpet:
* Poor stretching/fasten the underlay so the carpet wrinkles after a few years of use &amp; shampooing.
* Water damage, and wasn?t dry out properly.
* Old, bad underlay and/or old carpet in high traffics area.

To ensure carpet longevity you should get good &amp; thick underlay, because it will extend the carpet life, and it doesn't wrinkles the carpet as easily as the cheap thin ones.

 

[lowtech1]

If you are not a pro at tilling, then I you should pre cut, lay out (could use nails or pre cut cardboard pieces for gaping), and number the tiles in the area that you want to tile. Then stack the tile in the order that you wanted to lay it out. Apply as much adhesive as you can work at a time to avoid dry adhesive. If you are a comfortable handyman, then setting the tiles for an average bath room would take you less than 1 hours with pre cut &amp; lay out. The entire job with prep, layout, cut, set, grouting, sealing, and dry time will take at least 3 sessions (in a time span of 3 days to a week or more if you are lazy).

Vinyl flooring time for average bath room span from 6~8 hours for an average handy person &amp; sealing &amp; corking the bath room is less than 1 hour...And you can use the bath room the next day

 

[cxim]

you can probably re-stretch the carpet yourself. You can also redo the pad stuff. You can do new pad or somtimes put a new layer of thin pad over the old. There are glue tricks needed if you double pad. You never know till you pull up the carpet &amp; see what is underneath.

using a kicker &amp; stretching needs a little learning. The easiest way to do that is to find a guy &amp; do a trade for some computer stuff. There are a lot of carpet installer guys around that do side jobs. Get a guy to do one room, ask questions &amp; see what he does. Then do the other rooms.

As a group carpet installers are kind of like painters. Beer drinkers who do a toke on occasion.

 

[jonnyGURU]

Hmmm..... Trade for computer stuff. THAT'S something I can do!

Hmmm..... Beer drinking with a toke on occasion. THAT'S something I can do!