DIY Installation of Floating Engineered Hardwood Flooring
I’m happy to say that our hardwood floors are fully installed! The bulk of the credit has to go to my father-in-law, who while he has never installed any hardwood flooring before, provided the peripheral knowledge and common sense that is need in doing such home projects. My wife and I basically served as unskilled day laborers. 
If you’re looking to install your own wood flooring, you might want check out my previous post on picking out what type of flooring to buy and how to install it. We had a concrete subfloor, and we chose to float an engineered hardwood flooring over it. This might not be the best choice for everyone.
Prepping the Concrete Floors
The first part of installation is to make sure you have a relatively level subfloor. A rough rule of thumb is that you want to see no gaps thicker than 1/8″ of space if you lay down a 5 ft-long straight piece of wood like a 2×4 flat on the ground. (Or 1/4″ every 10 feet.) This part is important in order to avoid squeaks and squishy spots, and lazy installers (both hired and DIY) will simply lay over anything remotely flat. If you do demand proper prep and your floor isn’t flat, this can add to installation costs when contracting it out (and therefore savings if you do it yourself).
We were hoping preparation would just mean scraping excess carpet glue or drywall mud off of the subfloor. But we found that we actually had a good-sized area which was not flat at all. We tried using a hand grinder at first, but in the end we rented what they called a concrete planer in order to grind it down flat. It is a beast and we ended up with over 30 pounds of concrete dust everywhere. We had put up tarps, but it still got everywhere. This would have been horrible if we were already living in the house, luckily we weren’t. I think it cost about $250 to rent for a day.
Laying Underlayment
Next step was to lay down a thin blue foam underlayment on top of the concrete. The underlayment is designed as a moisture barrier between the wood and the concrete, reduces sound, and also adjust for the remaining minor irregularities in the subfloor. We just taped it down with duct tape. Some newer flooring products actually have this already on the bottom of the flooring.
Connecting The Pieces Together
Our flooring was tongue-in-groove, with glue applied in the grooves. Some other types allow you to simply click together, but we found this was mainly for laminate flooring. We put in spacers at the walls, as the floating floor has to be allowed to contract and expand with the seasons. Trim is added later to hide the gaps. You’ll need some sort of table or chop saw to cut the pieces to fit when you reach the other wall and at corners.
Trim and Moldings
Finally to make everything look nice, you’ll need to install moldings at walls, doorways, and transitions to other floor types. You’ll also have to cover up all the nail holes with putty so they don’t show. This all takes a lot of patience to do well, which can be tough when you’re tired of installing wood and you just want to be done already.
Final Verdict and Parting Advice…
We are very happy with the final product. I think anybody who is reasonably comfortable with tools and has the proper patience can perform this activity, the only question is if you actually want to. Either using up a week of vacation or giving up all your weekends for a month isn’t always fun, although I did learn a lot and lost some weight in the process. Oh, and there’s always the several thousand dollars in installation costs that we saved.
We do have some squishiness in the floor when walking on it, but it is not very prominent and we don’t mind. Of course it wouldn’t be there at all if we decided to do a glue-down floor, but I think it was still worth it to float given the time saved and the ability to easily fix any mistakes as we went.
As for parting advice… buy good knee pads! My father-in-law is old school and tough, and didn’t ever wear knee pads the entire time, so I figured I didn’t need them either. On the second day of installation, I started seeing red spots all over the underlayment. Did someone spill ketchup? Nope, my knees had blistered and were bleeding all over the place… Good knee pads are worth every penny. In general, it is worth it to buy the proper, quality tools for the job. If you’re doing this is as a weekend warrior type of activity, it takes a lot of determination to finish everything, so there’s no need to make things harder on yourself.
Find more in Frugal Living, Home Improvement | 5/28/08, 3:07am | Trackback
May 28th, 2008 at 4:34 am
“We do have some squishiness in the floor when walking on it, but it is not very prominent and we don’t mind.”
Though I did not go to flooring college but based on helping put in 2 of these floors and other friends who have these, give it time. That squishiness turns into squeaks and creaks. It seems the price you (in general) pay for trying to save money and doing it yourself are these little noises. I hope yours ends up different.
Worst thing that could happen: Water.
saladdin
May 28th, 2008 at 5:28 am
I’m not sure whether the picture in the post is from your project, but I recommend that you paint the base molding before you nail it to the wall. It’s a lot easier than trying to paint it after the fact. Then use white caulk at the top of the molding and white wood filler for the nail holes and touch up with paint.
Jon
May 28th, 2008 at 8:49 am
I applaud you for taking on such a large project as a DIY! Sounds like you’re happy with the outcome.
I have a question for you though. Looking back, would you say that you’re personal time was worth the money you saved? Or, would you say that you’d rather pay more to have your time back to do other things and have the knowledge that the work is guaranteed for some amount of time should something go awry?
My largest concern with doing flooring myself is that something will go wrong after the fact, and the expense, time and effort to repair it will far exceed just paying someone qualified in the first place (who probably guarantees the work for a period of time). I feel the same way with plumbing and electrical, as one small mistake can ruin an entire house. Everything else, I’ll try.
May 28th, 2008 at 12:53 pm
I had my hard wood floors professionally installed on top of concrete and glued to a liner. One other tool they have at their disposal is a special power saw that will trim door jams at the floor level so that the flooring can be laid directly under the jam. Makes for a nice neat floor. They also have colored putty to fill in areas where one needs to fill 1/8 to 1/4 inch gaps near doors, walls, etc. where you don’t have trim to cover.
May 28th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
“In general, it is worth it to buy the proper, quality tools for the job.”
This is one of the greatest DIY truths ever told. That being said, I have helped my father craft our own tools for things we didn’t have in media res, but the right tool usually pays for itself in headaches and also offers you the opportunity to use it again, whether for yourself or in helping someone else.
Sometimes the tools are a scam- fancy flanges or angles- but you cannot underestimate the value of having the right tool when it really does matter.
May 28th, 2008 at 1:51 pm
saladdin - Yes, I think the squeak level all depends on how flat your subfloor is, and the quality of flooring. I think all floated floors have a little inherent squish though.
INMT - That’s a good tip. We actually stained our trim (real wood) before nailing it in.
Lori - I think some people are just “DIY types”. We have an slight inherent distrust of contractors because of shoddy work we’ve seen, and we are a bit OCD and like to do thing ourselve. My mom recently paid to have some tile laid and it was all crooked. A “warranty” won’t cover things like that, only if the tile breaks or something. If I knew someone who would lay down hardwood with the care that they would take in their own home, I would pay them.
I wouldn’t do electrical myself either, but with flooring there’s not all that much that can go wrong if you read the directions. If you lay down a board wrong or if it was too long/short, I would just remove it before the glue dried. Main area of concern is floor prep I think.
MAC - We just did the door jams ourselves with a hand saw, took longer though I’m sure. The putty you can buy as well.
May 28th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
I definitely hear what you’re saying about shoddy work. I think it’s very cool that you guys took on such a big project on your own.
BTW, not sure if the finished picture is your floor, but I love the color!
May 28th, 2008 at 5:56 pm
Did you happen to use the glue they recommend for it in water prone areas? I used it for mine and I’ve had no problems no matter how much water go onto the floor.
May 28th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
There’s no such thing as a perfectly done home improvement. I figure if I do it myself at least I have the satisfaction of the accomplishment. I know exactly where I screwed up, but I can live with that. If I pay someone else to do it, I’ll eventually figure out what they screwed up and then I’ll feel either ripped off or like I screwed up hiring them in the first place.
May 28th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
After paying off our house in January (8 years early), we are finally ready to do all the upgrades we’ve been waiting to do. I want to do hardwood floors really bad, but there are things to consider. My husband (who is a mailman) and I both have foot problems, and even with area rugs, I’m afraid it would be hard on us. Are floating floors softer? Is there any hardwood floor that would be comfortable for sore feet?
We just ordered beautiful new leather furniture, and the hardwoods would look so good, but I have so many questions about the comfort. I had hardwoods in a previous house, and they were certainly easier to take care of than carpet.
But first things first. We are having our house completely re-plumbed. That’s not something I want to tackle myself, because I’m getting a lifetime warranty on it.
Back to the subject, what are the advantages with a floating floor versus one that’s attached?
May 28th, 2008 at 8:29 pm
Randy, do what I did tonight. I’m having my house re-plumbed, and the plumber found faulty drain systems. I called my previous plumber (who happens to be an old friend, too), and told him there were a couple of P-traps missing. He’s coming tomorrow to fix them for free. We all need to challenge those people who do the faulty work, and insist they make it right. Nobody wants to be reported to the BBB…even an old friend!
May 29th, 2008 at 2:48 am
I did use the special $8 per bottle of glue for in between the floor boards. Supposedly the stuff is significantly better than the cheaper glue from Home Depot. I am not smart enough to know if this is true, but I figured I’d go with the manufacturer recommended stuff.
May 29th, 2008 at 3:34 am
Yeah. It seems to be pretty good to me, so I don’t feel bad about using it even if it was a couple dollars more.
May 29th, 2008 at 11:01 am
caulk over baseboards… god no - it makes such a mess for the next person. i just tore up old carpet and put down tile - they had caulk on the walls - made my life miserable for an afternoon fixing it.
another tip - find a buddy and share labor - a friend and I have torn a kitchen and bathroom to the studs, removed 2 walls (to make both rooms bigger), hung drywall, re-laid carpet, and put in a tile floor in the past month… tile floor #2 goes in on saturday. two people who know what they are doing can move much more quickly than one - you will both benefit.
May 30th, 2008 at 4:21 am
Great project. We did a similar project using laminate flooring and also ended up with the squeaks and creaks from just using the poly foam underlay. When we came to the second room which we decided to use real wood, it was laid down on a base of plywood so the floor is now solid with no speaks and creaks (It cost a bit more but was worth it). Either way its a great saving on money and very satisfying to see the results after the task is complete.
May 30th, 2008 at 7:46 am
Instead of grinding off high spots on the concrete to make it flatter, you could have used a levelling product (kind of a real soupy cement mix) that you pour over the concrete to bring up the low spots. (Posted the odd chance that this information would be useful someday to someone reading it!)
June 14th, 2008 at 1:23 pm
Excellent job - if you’re looking for some extra income we’re hiring just now