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Pre-Finished Wood Floors

Pre-finished wood floors are a durable and environmentally sound alternative. It comes in a variety of styles and designs and it's a tongued and grooved product. The pieces are first laid out on the sub floor to ensure staggered joints. Then they are powered nailed.
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Pre-Finished Wood Floors

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" Hi! I'm Bob Vila from Home Again. Prefinished wood floors are a durable and environmentally sound alternative for your home. Prefinished flooring comes in a variety of styles and designs and it's a tongued and grooved product. The pieces are first laid out on the subfloor to ensure staggered joints, then they're power nailed."

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Installing the Plywood Subfloor
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Bob introduces Reggie Ray from Georgia-Pacific to discuss the laying of the sub-floor with southern yellow pine tongue-and-groove plywood. He discusses some of the advantages to using plywood over OSB, including fewer squeaks.

Tips on Fixing Squeaky Floors
Tips on Fixing Squeaky Floors

Bob talks with Howard Brickman of Brickman Consulting about how to fix squeaky floors. Brickman first he checks the moisture level in the joists to make sure it is in a normal range. Changes in moisture content cause wood to shrink and swell, which contributes to making floors squeak. Brickman reviews some of the cross-bracing that has been put in place to help make the floor stiffer. Having floorboards that run at an angle rather than perpendicular to the joists gives the floor more strength. Brickman explains how to fix a squeak, by first determining where the squeak is located, either between the sub-floor and the top of the joist or between the wood floor and the top of the subfloor. Brickman thinks the problem is between the wood floor and the sub-loor based on the sound of the noise. Screws are driven from the basement into the the sub-floor, pulling the wood floor and sub-floor above down and pressing them close together. A 2x4 is drilled into the top of the joist and the bottom of the subfloor to reduce the squeak by pulling the subfloor down tight to the joist. Brickman then discusses the use of shim shingles and construction adhesive to reduce squeaky floor noise when they are driven home between the joist and the subfloor.

Installing a Cobblewood Floor
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Birger Juell visits the home to supervise instalation of this unique floor. Use 3/8 or 1/2 inch thickness of wood. Type of wood is user preference but it should be as dry as possible. The wood tiles can be just about any size or shape as long as they are not too large or warping will occur. The grout for the cobblewood flooring is composed of sawdust from the wood mixed with a fast-drying oil-based sealer in a ratio of 2 parts sawdust to 1 part sealer add any stain to grout to your liking.Insure you have a standard sub-floor. First glue floor down, use regular tile mastic as an adhesive. rubber based instead of Water based is best. Let set for two days... Then grout, Pour the grout on the floor push it into the cracks using a rubber trowel or your hands. Trowel in the grout. Squeegee off the excess. Steel wool the face of the wood tiles to remove any remaining excess grout that could dry to the top of the bricks. Let it sit over night and then apply another coat of oil-based sealer the next day. Let set for one day. Then do final coat of varnish, stain etc. Maintain like any wood floor. Oil it every 2 years using wood floor oil. Varnish once a year. Buff once a month.

Building a Basement Rec Room
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Ryley builds out a rec room floor in the Plymouth house. Ryley explains how to keep the room from being damp. Ryley puts down 4 mil plastic then 2 by 4 pressure treated sleepers, to create a sub-floor base. Between the sleepers is rigid insulation then finally plywood is installed on top.

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