Basement Sub floor Panels - Are they worth it?

welcome to research and design build on today's episode we're going to cover the installation of these insulated sub floor panels we'll go over some of the pros and cons of installing these sub floor panels and also answer the question is this worthwhile and is this worth the investment [Music] before you can start laying down the subfloor towels and really getting started you got to make sure that everything is perfectly clean you had to remember that once these subfloor panels are down they're down so anything that's left on the floor underneath is gonna stay there and any bumps or other things are gonna get in your way and really prevent you from getting these nice and level so you can start on one corner and start working your way out now you notice the gut quarter-inch shims of those a cut made up and putting those against the wall so you want to be able to space about a quarter inch from all your walls to allow for a little bit of expansion and contraction of the panels and so that if there is any expansion that they're not hard up against the wall or some other studs as that will cause the entire lower or subfloor to start to bow now I got lucky I was able to start with a full board but you want to make sure that when you get to the end you're not gonna be just left with a little sliver also when you're making the cut you want to make sure that you've got the your cutting on the right edge as you've got the tongue-and-groove you got the tongue on two sides and you got a groove on two sides so you got to make sure that you're you're cutting it properly so that you continue with the same pattern you've got going already to make the cuts I'm using a Festool track saw I really enjoy this saw just due to the fact that the quality cut it gives the repeatability but then also the major factor using it inside is the very limited amount sawdust that that is produced and escapes soft vast majority of that ends up getting vacuumed up now you want to make sure that you've left enough space that you can still have that quarter inch gap on all the sides use a couple pry bars up against the wall to to get in there and tighten up groove and then after that put your shims up against the wall so that nothing moves I would recommend putting a lot of shims in on especially on the first first row because as you put in the the other rows you're going to be kind of hammering and pounding against it to try to get everything tight so you do want to make sure that those aren't gonna go anywhere and that space that quarter inch gap is maintained as you as you progress throughout playing these subfloor panels down for the second row you can start right where you left off now starting with a full sheet on this side or the full panel on this side will now stagger your joint so you do want to try to stay your joints and keep you know a fairly decent stagger five inches or more between them so again you got the spaces against the wall and making sure those are tight and then you can just continue laying down the next panels oh so you also need to make sure that when you are installing these panels that you have a sacrificial block of wood that you're hammering up against now this will avoid you damaging the tongue or the groove as you're hammering these into place the other thing to keep in mind and what you'll see in the video here is I do have some plastic shims which I am using to shim up any low spots this dry core product I'm using does have a checkerboard pattern on the bottom I believe this is a superior design from some of the other brands that are out there has I believe it'll allow for a little bit of air movement underneath the panels as well as allow for water movement if I do get any water in the basement in a point so just before I started laying down the sunflower panels I took some initial floor temperature readings so took nine temperature readings across the floor of the entire basement and the average temperature was five or 15.9 yourself is day after I got all the subfloor panels down I went down to took the same measurements in the same spots ambient temperature was the same and the temperatures are as the thermostat had been set the same as well in the average floor temperature raised to sixteen point five degrees so only 0.6 degree temperature rise however the coldest parts of the basement floor had been measured at fourteen point five degrees Celsius and that had raised to sixteen point three so the sort of the furthest space away from the furnace room and where there was some heat had raised by one point eight degree Celsius now the cost to do this project was not inexpensive each panel was about seven dollars Canadian so for the entire basement it's around thirteen hundred dollars to add this know you know this is an ad that probably if you're looking for a return on investment tend to sell the property I would not say is worth it it is gonna be buried underneath the flooring and for the average person that's walking in and spending ten minutes at most in your house before they're looking to buy it probably you're not going to notice the fact that there's insulated subfloor underneath the carpet or other flooring that's in the basement however you know I do think that raising the temperature of the coldest part of the floor by one point eight degrees is probably beneficial and even right now I can I can feel that there is a there is a difference there there's also a difference sounds sound perspective as well so you know I think that if you do have the money and you do have the the budget to add it it'll definitely make your basement a much more comfortable place to hang out if you have any questions or comments about this video or any questions related to installing insulated subfloor please leave in the comment sections below and I will make sure to get back to you now as always if you've enjoyed this video or found it informative please give it a like and please consider subscribing to the channel I'll have a lot more content on its way and please check out my other videos so here we've got the finished product making a little bit more to do around the tub but I'll do that once the tub is in its final location but overall it's a looking good and I would highly recommend this [Music]

Channel: Research Design Build

Views: 53,829

Rating: 4.891892 out of 5

Keywords: Dri-core, Sub Floor, Insulated Sub floor, Sub floor panels, Insulated Sub Floor Panels, Basement development, Basement Remodel, Basement DIY, DIY, Insulation, Warm Basement, Comfortable Basement, Energy Savings, Dry Basement, Wood Working, Research Design Build, researchdesignbuild, reseach, design, build, Basement Renovation

Id: 9ntU3lfx7Xw

Length: 8min 13sec (493 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 08 2020