Suspended Timber Floor Tile Prep

[acaciaguy]

I agree. The thing with bolting them together is that you aren’t increasing the x4 part. They do need support underneath. You are doing the right thing.

 

[Deyna]

I agree. The thing with bolting them together is that you aren’t increasing the x4 part. They do need support underneath. You are doing the right thing.

Ye, the strenght comes from the depth not the width. I can leave the existing frame "as is" then (the extra support for board joins isnt a bad thing plus it'll still be where foot traffic is).

Realistically its about 50 bricks and I'll just have to make do with workaround around the existing frame. I will feel a helluva lot more comfortable with it then!

 

[Andy Rhodes]

Blue engineering bricks good shout you've no need to use slate or DPM with them bad boys

 

[Deyna]

Ye for sure! I'll do the first two and consider rebuilding the others if thats the case to take up some of the slack underneath (upto 20mm shims in places). Feels like an extra weekend on it will be worth it in the long run.

 

[Andy Rhodes]

Preparation the key word always

 

[acaciaguy]

Couldn’t agree more Andy

 

[Andy Rhodes]

If you've got 50 bricks you could support most of your beams shown in your orginal pictures ,this would hopefully stop any bounce what so ever

 

[Deyna]

If you've got 50 bricks you could support most of your beams shown in your orginal pictures ,this would hopefully stop any bounce what so ever

Thats the plan! Max span will about around 1m then. Just need to decide on appropriate underlayment but I think Ditra would be OK to keep the height down to a minimum.

 

[acaciaguy]

Get everything flat and level now too. Will make the tiling easier.

 

[Andy Rhodes]

Denya are you using fast set or standard set adhesive

 

[Deyna]

Denya are you using fast set or standard set adhesive

I was going to ask for recommendation on that. Assume thinset for Ditra mat and then S2 adhesive for tiles?

 

[Andy Rhodes]

instead of Ditra how about backer boards or are you really tight on height

 

[Deyna]

Morning @Andy Rhodes !

I'm a little tight on height yes! The new subfloor is flush with the adjacent screed and the wood floor. Both substrates need a decoupling layer so Ditra would be the best bet from herein.

I built a couple more sleepers over the weekend, went back around and packed out with slate and plastic shims for small adjustments. Blocked in the frame at opposite corners. The max clear span now is approx 800m at any point. Ply joints have a small expansion gap.

Probably give it a more rigorous test this evening as I left the mortar to go off but on first showing it was much improved the missus did a bit of jumping mid span on a few joists and the laser was moving at most 1mm and nothing at all if you're walking around normally.

The length of the tiles are 1200mm, so when you run them perpendicular to the joists you're actually spreading the load along 4 lengths so I'm not worried about any interstitial deflection between them due to the ply thickness.

 

[Deyna]

I'm still torn on Ditra or 6mm hardie though. I can accept the extra height to strengthen the subfloor a little more for belt and braces

Would someone be able to recommend me suitable adhesive/grout for such large format tiles. Something thats got a bit of "flex" in it.

 

[Perry]

A little trick I found is cut strips of 3/4 ply the size of the joists and glue and screw to side of joists, it can make quite a bit of difference sometimes.