How To Change Flooring
Bloating of flooring, rotting of the flooring, we believe these are the common experiences of people living in mobile homes. When it comes to moments like these, it really makes us look at our wallets and tear up a little because it translates to renovation costs. This is why we have decided to come up with this guide on how to replace the sub-flooring of your mobile home when the above scenarios happen. This could help to increase your mobile home blue book value.
Before we go on to the guide, we would like to point out that it would be good to have construction experience for a home makeover project like this. So, this guide would be useful to those with existing experience and for those who have hired help to ensure that you are not getting ripped off with the services provided by experts!
What is sub-flooring?
It is made from sawdust and glue to put in simple terms. They mainly act as a sponge to absorb excessive moisture. Because of that, the sub-flooring will expand over time which causes the bowing and warping of your flooring. In order to prevent more irreversible damages, it is important to nip the problem at its bud, change the sub-flooring.
Material list for sub-flooring
You will need plywood which will ultimately serve as your new sub-flooring. Next, you will need to purchase some lumber in case you might need to replace the joists under your flooring. Additionally, you will need galvanized screws and liquid nail adhesive to ensure that everything stays intact.
How to replace sub-flooring
Now let us get down to the nitty-gritty details of how to replace the sub-flooring:
1. Remove vinyl or carpet or other types of flooring
This would be a good time to tell you that if you are intending on renovating the aesthetics of your flooring, this will be the perfect chance. Any vinyl or carpet or tiles covering the flooring would need to be removed. Before moving onto the next step, it is important to identify the cause of the bowing and warping, in most cases, it usually happens because of leaks. So, before moving onto the next step, identify the leaks and rectify them first.
2. Remove the sub-flooring around the perimeter of the room
Before you do this, you will need to measure the thickness of the sub-flooring. It is typically ¾” or ⅝” thick. This will determine the size of the plywood you would need to purchase to replace the old sub-flooring. Once that is settled, simply use a circular saw to go around the perimeter of the room whilst keeping away from the joists. If you damage the joists, it could spell more things to do and increase the workload. So, just beware of that.
3. Remove the sub-flooring between the joists
After removing those around the perimeter of the room, it is time to attempt the trickier part which is removing those around and between the joists. Now the tip here is to reset your circular saw to be the same size as the plywood between the joists so that you do not damage the joist. Next is to cut them into smaller pieces so that it is easier to slide them out while maintaining the structure. This same trick can be used if the sub-flooring under the walls are damaged. Otherwise, for those under the walls, it is ok to leave them alone if they are still in good condition.
4. Reinforce joists
Here is where the lumber plays its part in reinforcing your mobile home flooring. While we would love a perfect execution of removing damaged sub-flooring without a single damage to the joists, it is often a stretch because even experienced people, with years on their belt, will still make some mistakes. So, it is time to take a pause and check if the joists are still in good condition. If there are any damages, you can fix it up with the lumber pieces.
5. Reinforce insulation
When all that is done, the final step before putting in all the new sub-flooring is to check how well insulated your flooring is. This is a step that we recommend most people take extra caution with because it can go a long way towards reducing energy costs. Furthermore, before installing the insulation, do ensure that it is positioned below the wiring and pipings so that there is no obstruction.
6. Replace with new sub-flooring
We hope you still have some lumber pieces to spare as we might need to use them here as well. To fill the void, new plywood would be used as the new sub-flooring and these plywood are not fixed sizes. So, when you fill a particular section with plywood, you might need to use a few pieces of plywood. In these cases, there should be lumber pieces in each seam so that we can nail and glue down the plywood. This will ensure that the pieces are not loosely fitted together which could raise the very problems in the flooring that we have been trying to fix.
7. Replace with new floor covering
Now that we are done with painstakingly filling up all the cavities with plywood, here comes the fun part of this whole process: choosing your new flooring. When it comes to new flooring for your mobile home, you will be spoilt with choices as you can explore many different kinds of flooring. If you were using vinyl before this, maybe you could explore the soft touch of carpet this time. However, you do need to consider the room where you are replacing your flooring. If it is the bathroom, carpeting is definitely not the most ideal option out there.
Conclusion
We have come to the end of the short guide that we have compiled. Hopefully, this will be able to help homeowners who are more in-tune with DIY home projects. Of course, this home renovation is nothing like building up a shelf as it will require a certain level of expertise to execute. So, for those newer to such construction, you can just use it as a guide to better understand the process first!
