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i’m laying a 1/2″ x 4″ quartersawn floor over 3/4″ plywood over a membrane sealed slab (2 layers felt and mastic over epoxy sealer over slab on grade).the plywood is down. my question is what should i use between the ply and the maple. maple over felt over mastic over ply? maple over resen coated sheet over Mastic? over ply? thanks for any advice>
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Are you planning to nail it?
MD
*yes - 1 1/2" nails in a port-o-nailer.
*Well, that's a close call with the portonailer. The top of your tongue is probably about 1 1/8" from the surface of your slab. With the angle of the nails, you might get away with that, or the nails may strike the slab. I hate to say it, with the added cost, but another layer of flooring grade plywood would make it a better installation, using 2" nails, but I'm sure there will be support for doing it as is, if the nails do have enough clearance. I like the longer nails, they are almost impossible to pull out, therefore move at all within a t&g floor.
*thanks - i'm going to try to build a wedge for the shoe to see if i can change the angle enough to miss the vapor barrier. if not then ?
*I'm also interested in the question about what vapor barrier to use. My 3/4" quartersawn oak was just delivered today and is acclimating to the house for a few weeks (new construction). It will be over 3/4" plywood over regular joists with radiant heat tubing under the subfloor.The builder and floor guy were just going to use kraft paper. I told them I thought at least resin paper was called for. Then I saw something in JLC about a product called Moistop, which is "12 mil thick kraft paper and fiberglass reinforcing laminated between 2 sheets of black poly." This was recommended in an article that was about radiant floors, so maybe they think radiant floors should have something better than resin paper. Any ideas? Is this overkill?