We would like to install an engineered hardwood floor in a large family room. The room is over 700 SF.
The problem is the surrounding surfaces. Assuming a 20+ x 30+ room, the long side of the room is either a ceramic step or a ceramic wall. Approximately 70% of the perimeter is bordered by ceramic. How do we handle a floating floor if there is no perimeter molding to hide the void that allows the float to expand and contract?
Rich
Tom’s Answer:
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Tom: Understands. You’ve got to have an expansion joint all the way around the edge. What would be ideal, and this is going to be tough, is you’d take the bottom row of tiles off, set the floor so it goes past it, and set the tiles back on top so you don’t see the edge of the wood, but it still has a place to move. That’s the only real option if you’re doing a ceramic border, but that could be really difficult for him to do.
Charlie: Isn’t there some kind of ceramic toe molding or something he could put down there?
Tom: Yeah, I was going to say you can get some tile cove base or something of that nature and do a little double base on there, but the wood’s going to have to go underneath that.
Charlie: That is going to be a boogity bear of a job to do.
Tom: Yeah, and you can also use a shoe mold for wood, but you’d have to nail it to the wood and not the wall. I don’t know how it’s going to look. Without me being there to see it, I don’t know how it’s going to be aesthetically appealing.
Charlie: It’s a tough job, mixing those two.
Tom: Well, if it’s going to go into a tile base, yes. If it’s going up against tile, another floor, then it’s just a…
Charlie: Just a transition.
Tom: Yeah, a transition piece.