Vinly tiles has hump in them, and fitter says its just how old floors are, is that ok?

delmonta

I have been renovating my bathroom, and its an old victorian house with floorboards that are a bit all over the place, but not too bad. I did my best getting the floor quite flat, replacing some boards etc. When the LVT flooring guy came to do the quote I said is the floor ok, is it flat enough. He said yeah its fine, 6mm ply will cover up all the unevenness. I even said 'is 6mm ply enough, seems very thin' and he said yeah. 

So I came back today and he'd fitted it, but there was a noticeable lump in one area that spanned three tiles. Its noticeable to the eye, but very much so to touch or under the feet. I'm quite obsessive but I don't think a new floor should be anything but flat! I sent the photo to my brother who's a carpenter and he instantly spotted the offending area, even from a top down photo. In reality its more extreme. 

I said it to the guy, and he just said thats old floors, you'd need 18mm ply to cover it all up. I said that I asked him if the floor was flat enough before he started and he said yes. He's making me feel a bit bad as he's doing it really cheap and we've got along well so far. 

But surely if you own a flooring company, one of the main tasks is to sort the floor before laying the tiles? Its not really my responsibility to do that. I did a lot of work on the floor and asked him if it was ok. If he's said you'd need 18mm ply to get this feeling flat, of course I'd say yeah, use that! 

Now I don't know what to do, live with this lump in a new floor, which honestly makes the tiles look even more fake as you dont get lumps in real tiles

I don't want to get in a conflict and he's meant to be doing my kitchen very soon, and to be fair latexed the kitchen floor fine for prep. But in the bathroom if you put a straight edge on the 6mm ply just after he laid it, it would be incredibly obvious it wasn't flat! 

What are your thoughts? Can you spot the area I'm talking about

fenwick458

what is it, lino?
just take it up, level it better and re-lay it

Doozergirl

That's not LVT is it? 

People can't 'do things for really cheap' and do them at the highest standard.   LVT is expensive stuff and laid with 18mm ply because any decent fitter would refuse to guarantee it if it didn't, but that looks like a roll of vinyl to me and so thinner stuff to even out the majority of lumps and bumps is more par for the course when money is tight.  
 

Bear in mind your floor levels at the threshold too.  Raise it up by an inch, near enough, and you need to consider how the floor covering in the two rooms transition to one another. 

It wouldn't take a lot to add thicker ply to that though and it would help, but not totally remove that bowing.  

delmonta

Doozergirl said:

That's not LVT is it? 

People can't 'do things for really cheap' and do them at the highest standard.   LVT is expensive stuff and laid with 18mm ply because any decent fitter would refuse to guarantee it if it didn't, but that looks like a roll of vinyl to me and so thinner stuff to even out the majority of lumps and bumps is more par for the course when money is tight.  
 

Bear in mind your floor levels at the threshold too.  Raise it up by an inch, near enough, and you need to consider how the floor covering in the two rooms transition to one another. 

It wouldn't take a lot to add thicker ply to that though and it would help, but not totally remove that bowing.  

Thanks, this is the main LVT flooring guy in Bristol, I wasn't asking for super cheap. He does everything with Karndean, mostly the Opus range which I will use in my kitchen. And as far as I know Karndean are one of the best.

But he had some left over Polyfloor tiles which is why he did the bathroom cheap as an extra. I looked at them next some Opus samples I had, they are pretty much the same thickness, not a huge difference between them.

I just thought it would be his responsibility either tell me my floor wasn't flat enough, or to do it himself. I mean I got it pretty close and had my worries about 6mm ply, but he said it would be fine. 

He said 6mm is the standard, so I'm a but confused now if you're saying its 18mm. It kind of looks like a roll of vinyl to me too, but then I cant imagine the Kardnean looking much different as the sample tiles are basically the same.  Its confusing

omendata

Doozer is right you cant do any tiling job with 6 mill at least 12-18mm is required only the cheapo white van man does the job with stuff like that to save money and maximise profit - at least he used ply and not chipboard though most cowboys use osb or chipboard!

delmonta

omendata said:

Doozer is right you cant do any tiling job with 6 mill at least 12-18mm is required only the cheapo white van man does the job with stuff like that to save money and maximise profit - at least he used ply and not chipboard though most cowboys use osb or chipboard!

I just looked on the Karndean website, and it says this : 

Wooden subfloors – Karndean do not endorse/approve any plywood product and so take no responsibility for the performance of any plywood selected. However, we recommend the use of a minimum 6 mm flooring 
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So maybe 6mm is alright if the subfloor is as flat as possible and well supported. Still, I think anyone who installs a floor, having it flat and with no lumps and bumps is their responsibility!

rach_k

Could you tell me where the bump is, please?  I can't spot it (I've never been able to do those magic eye things either)!

If you live in a Victorian house, unless it's a trip hazard I'd probably just live with it, or pay him to do it again (as others have said, if it was a cheap job, you can't expect the same quality).  One of the 'joys' of a house that age is the imperfections.  It doesn't look like an expensive floor anyway so it wouldn't bother me. 

When we had our kitchen (concrete floor) done in Amtico tiles, the fitter came back three times to level it before he was happy to lay them.  When we had a brand new bathroom added (so a nice new level floor), he still boarded over the top to get it absolutely perfect.  

delmonta

I've just come back to day and it's pretty obvious to me.

I put a level down and it leave a 9mm gap, and it's quite sudden which makes it obvious. 
I know it's a Victorian house Andi don't have an issue with imperfections in floorboards etc. But a new floor that's not flat just because they didn't use thick enough ply? 
The floor is not expensive, but if you are going to have fake tiles you can't really have a bulge in the middle or you can't even pretend they are tiles

TELLIT01

Maybe I'm missing something, but if the base floor has a dip in it, it will still have a dip  almost irrespective of the thickness of ply laid over it, assuming the ply is secured down tightly.  Either that or the floor will give every time you walk on it.

delmonta

TELLIT01 said:

Maybe I'm missing something, but if the base floor has a dip in it, it will still have a dip  almost irrespective of the thickness of ply laid over it, assuming the ply is secured down tightly.  Either that or the floor will give every time you walk on it.

Yeah I was thinking the same thing when he said that. Maybe they could pack it very easily with a few packers at the low point, where as 6mm ply just moulds around everything. 

I'm considering ripping up the tiles (only took him an hour or so), then cutting out the 'lump' section, and then laying 15mm ply over the whole thing. If the lump is not too big, hopefully the 15mm ply would not flex over the hole I cut out. This seems like the simplest way to deal with it, considering they nailed down the 6mm ply. But I don't feel I should be doing anything, it seems like their job. 

The Karndean website says the sub floor should be by British standards of no more than 3mm over a 2m span, and this is an 8mm gap over about 30cm! 

The fitter said I only get the Karndean 25 year warranty if he fits it. But probably not if its not fitted to their guidelines. God its annoying!

sol2017

I'm far from an expert but I would have thought that in this case flooring installation should have included 1) planing down floorboards if possible 2) using plywood or insulation boards, 3) self leveling compound and only then vinyl.

I might be talking rubbish but to me that bump in the floor looks a bit unusual for floorboards and that it's worth checking underneath the floorboards for rotten joists or something else that may be causing it.

As I say, I'm no expert, just reading stuff online.