Flooring Update - Part 3

This may be the longest running project Mike and I have had to date. Because of our busy schedules, soaking up the end of summer and the tedious nature of the project - the flooring is still going. Oh, and did I mention this sent us the wrong flooring and took forever to get us new flooring. I say "new" because the original floor we ordered was discontinued and that's why the sent us the wrong flooring in the first place. The only benefit of all the hoopla is that we ended up being able to upgrade our flooring choice for the same price.

Anyways, after tearing out the flooring here and here, we began to lay down the underlayment. This has multiple purposes such as creating a smooth surface, sound reduction and being a moisture barrier. We bought the square footage we needed from a supplier we found online. It came in large rolls that we cut to fit our space. See below how the rolls of underlayment come together on the floor:

 

It was a short, quick process to secure one strip of underlayment to the other. (Note: The red tape on the floor in the picture above is where there was no other way to secure it to the others. This is because we had to run the roll perpendicular to all the other pieces running horizontal across the floor). Here is a picture of two rolls of underlayment we needed to secure together.

 

 

#1: Pull the two pieces together so the ends are flush.

 

#2: Peal off the white strip which reveals a layer of tape essentially. This will stick to the plastic layer other roll of underlayment.

 

 

#3: Pull over the plastic layer attached to the other roll over the tape. (Note: Each roll of underlayment had one edge with the tape and the other side with the plastic layer. This makes it so that each piece of underlayment can connect to the next - like a puzzle!)

 

 

Make sure to pull it tight and smooth the plastic layer over the tape. It's that simple! You just keep going along the entire edge of each underlayment piece.

 

Of course, we got to parts of the flooring where we needed to cut the underlayment for vents and corners. Here's a brief tutorial of how we Mike did this. Below is a picture of where we needed to cut for a vent:

 

Next, Mike pulled down the underlayment, creating a crease, showing where he needed to cut the piece. Then he took a pocket knife, running it along that crease. (I'm sorry if this seems easy-peasy but I'm just always so amazing at how Mike always knows exactly what do to. So this part of the post is for people like me that are perpetually stumped.)

 

 

 

After cutting, it was a simple tear off of the underlayment and job was done!
 



 

 

 

 

Up next - laying down the flooring! Until then, here's our house...