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Bottomless pit
Posted on October 7th, 2006 3 commentsMan, if it’s not one thing, it’s another. Way back in early August I bought some bamboo flooring, which I was planning on putting in the entry to the house. I figured that this project wouldn’t be so hard. Just take out the ugly 80s tile, slap down the wood, and I’m good to go. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Problem #1: The tile, which is sitting on top of concrete, did not like to come out. Took many hours of backbreaking work to finally remove it all.
Problem #2: A good percentage of the mortar didn’t come off the floor, and we’re STILL trying to chisel the last of it off.
Problem #3: According to the instructions that came with the bamboo, we need to glue the wood down to the concrete subfloor. That’s much more of a pain than just floating it, but the instructions say that floating is for professionals only.
Problem #4: Water had been coming under the door and window due to poor sealing. Since I don’t want to ruin the floor, we had to try to reseal it. BUT…
Problem #5: After removing the baseboard we discovered that the wallboard had been wet, and the wood behind it was rotting.
So, on Friday my dad and I replaced three pieces of wood and extended the 1 inch tall concrete “levee” to in front of the window. We also did some MAJOR sealing in all areas possible. All with the hope of keeping water away from my new floor, which we’ll install one of these days.
I put a few pictures of the current repairs after the link.
Here’s what the entryway currently looks like. Sorry, I don’t actually have a “before” picture anywhere! Some of the bamboo is spilling out of the box on the left
You can see the new wood we installed, plus what’s left of the damaged wallboard. The bottom and outer pieces are pressured-treated.
Here you can see the outer piece of treated redwood (soon to be stained) plus the extended cement “levee”. This was the third time in less than a year that I’ve poured concrete at this house!3 responses to “Bottomless pit”
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I can’t believe I’m saying this because I’m such a glass is half empty person (although I try hard not to be), but at least you know how to do all those repairs yourself. Some people (me!) would have to pay someone to do every repair / home improvement you have done to that house.
See, half full! Good luck with repairs. All the bamboo floors I have seen on TV are beautiful when they are finished and I’m sure yours will be as well. -
Just wondering if you would have been better off installing aluminum flashing to keep the water out rather than extending the concrete…
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laanba October 7th, 2006 at 22:47