Installing Engineered Hardwood Flooring Over Tile

Floor tiles usually should be laid over a strong underlayment of cement board or treated plywood.

Installing engineered hardwood flooring over tile.

Donna asks we are thinking about replacing our tile floor in the kitchen. This condition would make direct installation over the wood difficult. Solid hardwood or engineered wood flooring may serve as bases for vinyl flooring. If so make sure the floor is solid and well sealed.

One situation however does require more work and may call for removal of the tile. Yes you can install hardwood floors over ceramic tile but with a few exceptions. Some conditions apply but most are easily addressed. Installing engineered hardwood over existing flooring is a great option for people who have hard to remove floors such as glued down hardwood or glued down vinyl.

Whenever you install hardwood flooring over any type of subfloor you must ensure that it is completely level. You need to leave a 5 16 inch gap between the flooring and the baseboard or wall around the perimeter of the room to allow the floor enough space to expand. The simplest in terms of getting the job done without messy demo work would be a floating engineered floor. If your ceramic tile has grout lines that give it texture you will need to fill those in to make your flooring completely level.

If the wood is heavily gapped these gaps must first be fixed. Installing hardwood floors over tile. Wood flooring can be installed over existing ceramic tile terrazzo or marble with proper underlayment or adhesives only on manufacturer s recommendation. If you were to install the floor by using all the planks from one box before opening the next you run the risk of installing the floor with large mismatched patches of flooring.

Old solid hardwood can cup or swell over time too. When installing a floor over your existing floor you will want to choose an engineered wood floor that is at least 1 2 thick and over 4 3 4 wide. A concern with engineered flooring however is that the colors may be quite uniform within an entire box but have distinct tonal differences from one box to the next. Is it possible to lay hardwood over an existing tile floor yes you can lay a wood floor over tile if the existing floor is in good shape and without cracks.

Wood flooring of this type would need an intervening underlayment. Still you may need to tile directly over an existing hardwood floor for instance to avoid raising the floor level significantly relative to an adjacent floor. Engineered flooring goes down over a thin foam sheet which provides cushioning and sound dampening. I would suggest 3 8 thick prefinished engineered hardwood flooring.

Floating floors were designed for. This isn t to say you can install laminate over every tile floor. The planks glue together to create a floor that floats moves freely as a unit. For years the only solution to installing hardwood floors over tile was rip it out and install the wood floor.

What types of installations over tile.