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Leveling a plywood subfloor

snappyinbrooklyn

14 years ago

Hello everyone! I am new to GardenWeb. I ran a search but couldn't find exactly what I was looking for - so please forgive me if my post is repetitious of previous ones. I've been living in a rental apartment for 10 years now that has carpet on the bedroom and living room floors. I want to convince my landlord to allow me to remove it. I read the posts regarding Novalis and Allure/Konectco vinyl plank floors that look like wood. I think my landlord may be willing to pay for this flooring because it is so cheap (I'd need about 300 sq. ft. including the 'just to be safe' overages.) I never wear shoes in my apartment, never move the furniture about and my cat is declawed so I would expect either flooring option to hold up well over time. I would like to further save him money by installing it myself. The problem is that the subfloor is too uneven to attempt installing vinyl floors. There are even a few spots with noticeable dips. I don't want to ignore them and floor over it only to have the vinyl peel up on me. In my efforts to save the landlord money, I am curious to find out if I can level the subfloor myself. If it would take too much effort beyond a beginner's abilities, then my next question would be whether or not it would be feasible for me to sand and stain the plywood subfloor myself and simply walk on that. I peeled back a corner of the carpet in a few spots to check out the sub and realized that the wood is very splintery in some spots. Is that normal? Thank you all in advance for your help :)

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Comments (3)

dehutch
14 years ago
The best way I know to level your floor would be to pour in floor leveler in the low places. Be very careful to pour on just a little at a time, it's easy to get too much. Take a trowel around the edges of the puddle to pull it out to be level with the rest of the floor. It will adhere to the plywood but I don't know if the vinyl will stick to it. You'll have to ask someone who sells it. If it won't stick then you'll have to lay down another layer of 1/4" Luann first. It's cheaper than more plywood and it comes thinner. You can cut it with a jigsaw. I don't know how adventurous you are but I'm a woman and I have already done this, except that I put down Cement Board instead of Luann because I laid down ceramic tile on top of that in my kitchen. It's amazing what you can figure out how to do when you want something bad enough. You can get a video just about anywhere or bring one up online to show you how to do just about anything. God bless
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sweeby
14 years ago
If the dips are no more than 1/4" deep, you may be able to level them with a few layers of heavy-duty roofer's felt. That's what they often use under hardwoods. If it's more than 1/4" but you can level them to within 1/4", then you may be OK. If they're worse than that, it would take major construction work, so carpet would be your best inexpensive option.
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snappyinbrooklyn
Original Author
14 years ago
Ok...so it's beginning to sound like the leveling may be out of my league...how hard would it be and what would it entail for me to sand and stain the subfloor myself and just walk on that?
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