Minimum Sub Floor Thickness For Laminate

A 3 8 inch subfloor is the bare minimum needed to be a good support.

Minimum sub floor thickness for laminate.

That s not a lot of separation in a 10 foot radius. The quality usually depends on the amount of wear layer that is sprayed over the photographic layer and the materials used for its manufacturing. When nwfa guidelines minimums are not met the recommendations are to overlay the existing subfloor material with a 1 2 inch panel product or add structural support from below. This is usually 3mm thick or 1 8 thick.

The building code requires 5 8 inch plywood or osb. For laminate flooring plank thickness is measured in millimeters mm. Flooring products like swiss krono will state plank thickness on their packages or in their advertising by measuring the entire plank thickness from the bottom surface that rests on the subfloor to the top of the plank. A millimeter is roughly 0 039 inches.

For heavier floors such as hardwood something closer to 9 16 of an inch is better. 1 2 subflooring is definitely not enough. For tiles with all edges less than 15 the maximum allowable variation is 1 4 in 10 and no more than 1 16 in 12. As a rule the biggest difference you can have between two adjacent high points is 3 16 of an inch.

Subfloors must be flat in order to properly support your flooring. For joists spaced more than 19 2 inches on center the minimum thickness for plywood is 7 8 inch and for osb 1 inch. For large format tiles with one edge greater than 15 and for natural stone tiles the maximum allowable substrate variation can be no more the 1 8 in 10 and 1 16 in 24. The thicker the board the more it will cost you.

If your subfloor has excessive voids or bends you will need to level your floor before you begin installation. Laminate floors with a thickness of 12 mm to 15 mm feel more like hardwood floors than thinner laminates. Laminate flooring thickness ranges from 6mm to 12mm. Even when the underlayment is pre installed you might still want to add a small moisture barrier layer underneath to keep more moisture away from your flooring.

For joist spacing of more than 16 inches up to 19 2 inches on center the minimum thickness for both plywood and osb is 3 4 inch. For joist spans 16 inches or less nwfa recommends minimum panel thickness of 5 8 inch plywood or 23 32 inch osb. The 3 8 laminate flooring such as the click lock produced by many manufacturers is a fine floor.