I'm tossing back and forth the ideas of wood or paving stones. I'm not too worried about being up a step from the rest of the floor.
And since it's storage space, I doubt code would require a window. Thanks. From: blindhandyman@yahoogroups.com [mailto:blindhandy...@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Dale Leavens Sent: Wednesday, May 19, 2010 10:45 AM To: blindhandyman@yahoogroups.com Subject: Re: [BlindHandyMan] Putting in a basement floor A couple of suggestions depending on exact circumstances. Is there an existing concrete floor in the rest of the basement you wish to level up to? What is it's elevation. You probably prefer to have it similar height. That might mean some excavation or some fill. Now poured concrete nicely bedded on crushed rock and sand would probably be ideal but without a window to access the area that would be a filthy job. Maybe there is reason to insert a window for light, egress and of course to allow access to the space for the installation of a floor. Now as for elevation, I would suggest about three inches of sand base leveled to the thickness of 18 inch or 24 inch pre-cast patio slabs thickness below the present floor grade. Actually another quarter inch so that the slabs can be tamped flat and secure. You would probably not go too wrong to lay a film of poly on the earth before the sand. It might be necessary to excavate some dirt first. Of course now you have hauled dirt, sand and patio slabs through the house so, why not cement? A pressure treated floor too will last longer than you are likely to need it. You could get away with quite narrow joists if you sunk something like 6 by 6 treated timbers, one at each edge and a third down the middle. getting them truly level before adding the joists would take some patience, again my trick is to excavate a little deep then fill with crushed rock the bottom of the trench and tamp the timbers down until level then pack around them with more stone to keep them stable and drier. Now 2 by 8 or even 2 by 6 joists on 16 inch centers would make a firm support remembering that the span will be less than 6 feet. If the footing timbers are above the grade a little you could even go to engineered joists for further rigidity as they will be out of the mud then apply decking as per usual. I understand that these days they glue the decking down onto the engineered joists to produce a "monolithic" structure. If the basement walls are cement block you might consider adding a window. Modern code may require though that this be suitable for egress in case of fire and that may be a larger window and well and more than you wanted. Hope these are helpful ideas. Dale leavens If I was Han Solo I'd probably pet my wookie ----- Original Message ----- From: Tom Vos To: blindhandyman@yahoogroups.com <mailto:blindhandyman%40yahoogroups.com> Sent: Tuesday, May 18, 2010 7:43 PM Subject: [BlindHandyMan] Putting in a basement floor Are there any alternatives for a basement floor other than concrete? We have a room in the basement with a dirt floor. It's not very usable that way, but to get concrete down there will be tough. There are no windows, so concrete would have to be hauled through the entry and kitchen and down the stairs. Or we could carry bags of Redi Mix, but it's going to take a whale of a lot of bags to do the room. It's only about 12 feet square, but that's a lot of lugging. Any ideas? Blessings, Tom [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
