Hi All,

We're renovating a small victorian terrace house and have put down a Limecrete floor system on the whole of the ground floor approx 18 months ago (provided by Ty Mawr). There is also a wet underfloor heating system installed in the slab (boiler not currently connected).

We're now at a stage where we're looking at the floor covering, our first choice would be an engineered wooden parquet floor which we've found. We've spoken to several local flooring companies about installing it but there seems to be lots of confusion over working with Limecrete.

Several contractors have said that they have to put down a self leveling compound otherwise the slab will dry out the adhesive too quickly. Obviously this isn't an option as it will affect the breathability of the floor, I've done some research and there doesn't appear to be a breathable option on the market? One contractor said he would have to put down a sub floor over the Limecrete which we want to avoid as we don't have much room to play with before the finished floor level starts to end up higher than our external door sills.

So my question is has anyone successfully installed a parquet floor on limecrete with just adhesive or is this not possible/advisable?

Any help/advice would be appreciated.

Thanks,

James

Have you talked with the limecrete company? I would think they would be the best place to start.

Posted By: owlmanRe limecrete no experience but you could also look at decoupling membranes perhaps something along those lines may be a possibility. Some of them have voids/channels on the underside.

Thanks for the reply and recommendation, I've not come across these before but I'll take a look and see if any of the flooring fitters think they're an option.

Posted By: JontiHave you talked with the limecrete company? I would think they would be the best place to start.

Yes Ty Mawr are always really helpful, they've just said what I thought really in that they can't see any problem with laying that type of floor down and that they're not aware of any breathable self levelling compounds. Haven't asked about the adhesive drying bit though, might do that now.

Posted By: Peter_in_HungaryOver here the engineered wood flooring manufactures recommend a DPC membrane over any new solid floor and suggest that a membrane would be a good idea anyway.

When they say the adhesive will dry out too quickly. Which adhesive is this? Is it the construction adhesive used to in the manufacturing process (doubtful), Is it the adhesive gluing the wood to the floor (if used) or is it the adhesive holding the bits of engineered wood together. If the last, I have used click fit engineered wood which needs no adhesive to lay and has been own 8 years in the main room with a family of 5 (3 young boys) with no problems. The floor is laid as a floating floor.

I think the fitter was referring to the adhesive that will stick down the parquet although I've just realised the parquet we've chosen is click fit so I'm wondering if adhesive is still needed? Another thing to check I guess!

Thanks for the replies/help much appreciated.

Posted By: owlmanHow much available FFL room do you have to play with?

Not a whole lot as we've only really left enough for adhesive and the parquet. Perhaps 5-10mm tops.

James, I've had similar but slightly different conundrum... we've also put a limecrete floor with UFH in and are planning on putting engineered wood flooring over part of it (and limestone flags over the other part). I've been concerned that putting a Damp Proof Membrane under the wooden floor defeats the purpose of the breathable floor, so have been looking for breathable underlays on which to "float" the floor. The membranes which owlman has suggested may do the job but two others I've uncovered (and which don't appear to have DPMs, are Heat Therm EWA3 and Quick Therm. I suspect that I'll also need a decoupling membrane of some sort under the limestone flags but haven't started to research that yet! The alferpro or dural mats might be just what I need there!