My mum is getting her bathroom refitted. She's now got a shower enclosure instead of a bath, and she's had her toilet and sink replaced. The flooring in the bathroom has historically been an issue as it bangs loudly (it didn't creeks or squeak, but bangs), which is not good when someone is trying to sleep in the adjoining bedroom. Part of the carpet has been lifted in order to remove the bath and fit the shower enclosure. It can be seen that the subfloor is chipboard. My mum is replacing the carpet with vinyl. Given the issues with the chipboard "banging" when people walk on it, the fact that chipboard is meant to be "****" and the fact that she wants to lay vinyl, would it not have been better to rip up the chipboard and put down one or two layers of plywood? The shower enclosure has though already been fitted on this chipboard. The intention is to put 9mm plywood on top of the chipboard to form the sub floor for the vinyl. Should this be ok? Should the plywood be screwed/nailed to the joists? - will this eliminate the banging noise associated with the chipboard?
As you've said, would have been much better to rip out all the chipboard, check the joists for any movement or uneveness (possibly causing the banging) and replace the lot with 18mm ply but ....... Oh well So if ply is now going over the chip, you obviousy have to find the cause of the banging and sort the issue before laying the ply How annoying would it be to ply the floor and still have the same problem Screw down rather than nailing but your screwing into 18 mm chipboard I guess so the fixing isn't going to be brilliant. Would be nice to screw into joists but without first lifting the floor, your not going to be sure of pipe runs and run the risk of hitting a pipe If the flooring people are laying the ply, they will probably use an air nailer anyway, as long as the chipboard is in ok condition and flat, and loads and loads of nails are used, it will probably be ok. As long as the banging chipboard issue has been sorted first though as 9mm ply wont help this Good luck
Thanks very much for your reply, much appreciated. And thanks for confirming my thoughts. If only I had been involved with this project from the beginning...!
DIYDave, would it be possible to leave the shower enclosure on the chip and replace the chip elsewhere with ply? For your information, wet wall has already been fitted to about half the bathroom walls (skirting boards removed), and the other half will be fitted when they do the floor. I mention this as the wet wall will likely (I'm not at my mum's just now) come down to, or close to, the top of the chip, thus I'm assuming that the opportunity for replacing the chip with ply has now gone? Thanks again.
I wouldn't nail the plywood down. It would be better if it was glued and then screwed to the chipboard and preferably the joists underneath. Gluing and screwing will give you a much more rigid floor and reduce flex. Make sure that before the vinyl is fitted all screw/ nail holes are filled and all edges are flush and filled. There is nothing worse than in 6 months time you start seeing seam lines and fixing holes in the vinyl surface.
Forums
Facebook
Twitter
You Tube
Instagram
Shop