Pine wood floors on 2x4 risers?

Question

I'm redoing my own kitchen right now and in the process of tearing up the wood floors in the kitchen. The previous owners tiled over the wood but sucked at everything they attempted to do. Anyway. We tore up the tile and hardie, then started to tear up the wood and it's suspended by 2x4 risers and the 2x4s are set into place on the concrete with tar?! I've never heard of this and wondered if anyone else has? They also had a plastic moisture barrier laid down, but over the 2x4s (directly under the wood flooring. If you were going to do such a thing, wouldn't you put the plastic directly on the floor?

Thanks,

Justin

Thanks,

Justin

Matt Huber · Answer

Hardwood floors are put over concrete via skids laid in tar (or construction adhesive) over concrete since you can't nail the hardwood into concrete.  Better practice is to put a plywood subfloor in which to nail over the skids. It might be OK to put in two layers of OSB in opposite directions so the seams don't match (for better strength. Since concrete is porous and water vapor can penetrate, vapor barriers may be desired under the floor.

My house had an old garage transformed into part of the house and the skids were on tar.  The skids was OK except they used  particle board for the subfloor, which was absolute crap.  Additionally since I was changing the floor to 3/4" cherry hardwood, I did not like all the elevation changes with adjoining rooms so we completely tore out the old skids and replaced them with new ones to adjust the elevation.  Since a garage floor is sloped, we needed shorter skids the closer we moved towards the center of the house to make everything level.  We also put in cross bracing to further insure the skids weren't going to move.

If you have too much height between the concrete and the ceiling, make the adjustment via the height of the skids and the thickness of the subfloor.  Make sure to calculate the height what else you may be using, for example hardie backer and tile versus 1/4" laminate, 1/2" engineered wood, or 3"4" sold wood would produce uneven abutted finished flooring if you are transitioning from one material to the next.  Since you're already tearing down to the concrete, that can be adjusted by skid height.

David Gay · Answer

I rehabbed the house my wife and I live in (San Antonio). Flooring contractor did the tar and 1x4 skids. Tar acts as a moisture barrier over the slab foundation. Traditional White Oak flooring over the top. They planned the 1x4's to level the floor. The results turned out nice. Some flooring boards don't end on a skid and will squeak when walking on it. Some might complain, it reminds me of wood flooring over a pier and beam foundation, so for me, its actually a plus.

Matt Huber · Answer

You may not want to use pine floors as pine is very soft.  I love the look of my cherry floors but I would never use them again IF I have large dogs inside, which I do.  The dogs go crazy when they expect their daily walk and dig into the soft wood with their claws when they run, causing indentations and scratch marks.  The same will happen with any soft wood like pine.  Another error I would rectify is not to take the wood all the way to entry and exit doors.  I would put a masonry finish on the floor at the entries/exits at least 5 foot into the house from the door way.

I greatly like the look of cherry compared to the older half of the house which is all white oak wood with a "golden oak" finish, but the oak is way more durable even with an extra 50 years of age on it!

Justin Fox · Answer

That's neat.  I don't know a lot of people but I'm sure my wife would.  Seems like she knows everyone lol.

Jay Ritchie · Answer

@Justin Fox  Good deal.  Good luck with the rehab.

I see you are in Vidor.  I know some Murphey's from Vidor.

Justin Fox · Answer

@Jay Ritchie

We decided to just terminate the line and cap it under the cabinet.  We're just going to get a wall oven/microwave unit instead so we can do a thinner island that takes up less space (18").  Just a working counter top really.  We got the floors up and will proceed to take off all the cabinet doors and get our measurements to our cabinet guy to get shaker doors and drawer faces.  After that, we'll make and install concrete counter tops, prep for the apron sink installation, spray the cabinets, doors and trim, paint the walls/ceiling, install the doors and then put in the brick floor.

That's our plan of action at least.

Jay Ritchie · Answer

@Justin Fox Would there be a way to use half brick and mortar to handle the electrical run?

Not sure which would be more work, but jack hammering sounds like a lot of work

Justin Fox · Answer

@Matt Huber

I think we're actually going to go with brick, it's the same height as the skids plus the wood flooring and we won't have to lay sub floor plus hardie and THEN put ceramic tile.

Thanks for the info.  We knew the floor was suspended before, but not 1.5" off of the floor with tar everywhere.  Kind of sucks but I'm just ripping it up little by little and scraping up the tar when I get done with ~4x4 sections.

Thanks again!

Matt Huber · Answer

If you are after a pine look, a laminate floor with a pine look will handle large animals much better than actual pine itself.  Laminates have very durable finishes.

Even without large dogs, dropping heavy items on a pine floor will leave a noticeable indentation.

Justin Fox · Answer

Well since the wood was suspended, the toe-kick on the cabinets are like 6".  I think we're going to go back with brick with a herringbone pattern OR ceramic tile with a nice molding on the toe kick.  We haven't decided yet.

They had wiring to a island too and it is in a 1/4" pvc pipe under the wood.  I'm going to have to jack hammer up and bury in the slab (if tile), or weave through brick holes possibly.

Thanks,

Justin

Pine wood floors on 2x4 risers?

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