Real wood floor on concrete?

[jeffhaney]

How does one go about installing the old style, real wood tung and grove flooring (you know, the kind you nail down to the subfloor or floor joists) over concrete?

JB

[Kyle Boatright]

Real wood isn't an appropriate material for concrete floors. If you want a wood look and feel, you'll need to go with one of the "Engineered Wood" products or a Laminate product, and glue it to that floor.

[Art]

I agree except you may be able to float the engineered product instead of glueing it.

[Edwin Pawlowski]

Easy answer: you don't

The only way is to put down some 2 x 4 sleepers, vapor barrier, insulation, etc. While it can be done, it is not practical in most cases as the floor is raised a few inches. This becomes a real PITA where the floor meets other rooms, stairs, etc.

In my case, I used an engineered wood floor.

Much easier to isntall, no raised flooring and looks good. It has been down for abot 15 months now.

[Wayne Whitney]

The best way I've read about (never tried it) is to use a floating subfloor: a 3/4" plywood subfloor is built up on the level concrete by laminating two layers of 3/8" plywood sheets. The layers run in opposing directions with all joints staggered. Then the T&G flooring is nailed down to the floating subfloor per usual, with care that the fasteners don't hit the concrete.

As other have mentioned, in this situation one must be concerned about moisture, and the common wisdom to use an engineered wood floor product. Come to think of it, such a product is similar to the floating subfloor with conventional T&F flooring, just thinner.

Cheers, Wayne

[call_me_al]

Gee, they do it all the time here in Oklahoma. Almost every new house has concrete floors and many use real wood. The installers nail 4x8 sheets of plywood down using either concrete nails or hilti nails (expensive), I believe they also use a tar paper or moisture barrier below the plywood subfloor. However, most of these installs or done before cabinets, trim, doors etc., still I think it is possible to do to a finished home.

[LDR]

Using T&G wood on concrete is a time tested way to go and I doubt there is a book dealing with woodfloors that doesn't spell it out. Even my Portanailer has a gadget specific to nailing wood into concrete floors. (It drives the nail at a shallow angle.)

Anyway, I had some leftover wood and used it on a fairly large concrete floor in our basement. It is a kind of overkill, but I spend a lot of time there and love it, and it has held up very well over the last several years. Go for it!