Installing Solid Hardwood Floors Over Particle Board

Installing solid hardwood floors over particleboard plain and simple answer is no.

Installing solid hardwood floors over particle board.

Start with a small area so you can reach across wet glue without stepping or kneeling in it. They are available in 3 4 inch thickness as well as low profile styles that are 5 16 to 5 8 inch thick which are a good or installing over existing flooring. Spread flooring adhesive on the particleboard with your flooring trowel. The home is about 35 years old.

Use a thick piece of plywood to help shore up your particle board subfloor at least 3 4 inch thick. Solid wood floors should not be installed in basements or below grade. The particle board does not run under the walls. Like unfinished hardwood floors the prefinished types typically have tongue and groove edges on all sides.

If this type of underlayment is present it will have to be removed when planning to install a nail or glue down hardwood floor. To our dismay when we ripped up the old carpet we found that the whole subfloor was covered with particle board. That option is floating a floor over top of the subfloor. But the additional height of both the particle board and the new flooring may pose a problem with doors and appliances.

Make a line of glue the length. Last year we installed solid oak hardwood floor in our main bedroom and family room. Using a standard nail gun to install the floor was out of the question particle board isn t structurally sound enough to bite nails. Nails won t grip the particle board but screws do a better job.

I pulled up all the carpet and found 3 4 particle board over 1 2 plywood board subfloor underneath the carpet. It is particle board and not osb. The reason you can only float a floor over particle board is because nails won t hold in the particle board and glue will ruin the particle board. When thinking about installing wood flooring in a situation where the only subfloor is particle board you really only have one option.

If desired particle board underlayment can be left in place if a floating engineered wood floor or a floating laminate floor system is going to be installed over it. The reason floating installations work and are the best suited for installation over a particleboard sub floor is because a floating floor is not secured to the sub floor in any area.