Ask Jon Eakes

Last Updated: Wednesday, January 28th, 2004, Created: Wednesday, January 28th, 2004

Floor covering in a basement

I'm asked a lot about covering a floor in a basement. There are several considerations to We need to deal with the hard and cold concrete and maybe with levelling the floor. Of course we need to pay attention to water, either coming from outside the house or from plumbing spills inside the house since the basement is the bottom line where all water finally stops and that is the reason that real hardwood floors almost always get into trouble when they are installed on a basement floor.

Foam insulation under the slab is the best way to deal with the coldness, done during original construction. If that was not done, then you could put foam and plywood over the slab for both moisture protection and insulation, but that becomes quite expensive. So what do we do in real life?

Both vinyl flooring and industrial carpets can be glued right to the concrete. This is neither soft nor warm, but it is direct and quick. Water coming from anywhere will cause these floors problems. You could put a floating floor in the basement but because of the high potential for water from somewhere to get to this flooring, you should not use masonite based products but rather what are called engineered flooring made out of a real plywood base and real hardwood top. Even this would get into trouble with a large water spill.

If you have a radically uneven floor, you will need to build a sub-floor. That allows you to level it out, have drainage under the floor and stand off of the concrete. Of course you lose a lot of head room and building a level floor is a big job.

The practical alternative, when you don't need to level out a radically un-level floor, is Delta FL. It comes in two different forms: a sheet of dimpled plastic as you see in the first photo and in 2 foot by 2 foot panels of OSB glued to the same dimpled plastic material sold under the name SubFlor or DriFlor. In either case those little feet hold the flooring up off of the concrete for some softness and a lot of separation from the cold concrete while they also provide for unobstructed drainage right under the floor. You can use pieces of the Delta FL itself as shims for minor dips in the floor.

We did some cost comparisons for a whole range of possibilities for your basement floor. Remember that these prices will be only relative to each other because they were for a given day in a given city in Canadian dollars and prices for each element do vary regionally and with time.

When a contractor rolls out Delta FL for about $0.76 CAD a square foot, they will usually cover it with 5/8 inch T&G flooring panels, bring this quick sub floor to about $1.39 CAD a square foot. Surprisingly, the DIY 2x2 SubFlor version with OSB glued to the plastic came out slightly cheaper at $1.37 CAD a square foot.

Vinyl and industrial carpet can be glued right to the floor of a dry basement for about $1.20 CAD a square foot, but they are not warm nor moisture protected.

For $5.25 CAD a square foot you can get an engineered wood floating floor that goes over a plastic sheet and the foam pad which sit right on the ground. This gives you a little separation from the cold concrete, some protection from moisture coming from below the slab but no protection from a plumbing spill.

If you want to put the carpet or vinyl flooring over the Delta FL, the dimples will show through, so you must use the plywood. That about doubles the cost of these floorings compared to using them right on the concrete but turns them into trouble free flooring.

Here is a nifty money saving trick. With engineered flooring, you can put down the Delta FL without the plywood at about $0.76 CAD the square foot and the laminate with its foam pad can be put right over it. The wood bridges the dimples. So for very little more than just a floating floor, you get the protection and comfort of Delta FL. This is a very nice way to finish a basement floor.

Keywords: Basement, Carpet, Drainage, Floors, Hardwood, Laminate, Moisture, Protection, Types, Vinyl

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