I am remodeling my Barth and was wonderings the ups and downs of installing Laminate Floors, It seems like they would work well. Any help would be great, Thanks

I used laminate in my Barth bathrom sucessfully, & last summer I installed some in our house.

They were different varieties. The panels in the Barth were foam backed, and installed without adhesive. The pieces snapped together, and required the seams to be sealed, which I would have done anyway since the bathroom is wet. The rig has gone about 3000 miles since.

The panels I used in the house also snapped together, but they had no backing on the panels. Instead, they float on a thin foam underlayment that comes in rolls. They too installed with no adhesive.

I wouldn't use that kind in an RV that drives on rough roads, I'd be afraid that bumps would jar it loose.

Thanks for your help, anyone else?

We used Armstrong 1 foot square stick down tiles in a fiver. We went to great effort to make every cut perfect so we would not have to put down molding around the edges.

Do you remember in grade school when the teacher left the room and the kids moved about, and then scrambled to get back in their places when they heard the teacher's heels in the hallway? Well, that is what our tiles did. The ran around and ran footraces or something, then scrambled to get back into place when they heard us coming. But they never quite got back perfectly. Every time we went in the trailer, it was a bit different. Very disapoointing. Now, this trailer was parked on the Colorado River south of Blythe, so it got up to 128 outside, and who knows what inside, so this may not apply to you folks. But I will never use peel and stick tiles again. Well, maybe when we sell the house.

Had a similar experience with peel and stick tiles in a park model in Indio, CA. Same temperature situation as well.

Shouldn't be a problem with laminate, the laminate is rigid, & in larger panels. The laminates I used both advised leaving a quarter inch gap at borders to allow for expansion and contraction with temperature changes. You could probably get away with less in the Barth, the areas to be covered are so small.

Armstrong and Pergo have divided up the major part of the high end snap together tile/wood laminate market. We used Armstrong on our screen porch, with temp. range on it of 100+ to -15 below , its nice under foot with its foam backing which is very forgiving of surface height +/- 1/8". Its 2+ years old and no problems. As a real estate appraiser I have been in many homes with Pergo and have yet to see a worn surface , even with lots of kids in the house.JKB

The problem with the adhesive-backed stuff is that it's designed for non-porous underlayment. The prior owners of my SOB used stickum tile, and some pieces have lifted. Contact cement cured the few that tried to run away. I'd suggest sealing the subfloor with something if self-adhesive anything is used.

I used a wood laminate flooring in the redo of my 27'er. I installed it "floating" and would'nt even consider fastening it down. It looked great and as long as you took your shoes of on the way in would last a long time. The only reason to be careful of the wood products is that you generally can't refinish them. It took me about two nights to do the whole rig.

I used granite and marble in the bathroom, it came out really nice but call me before you use tile and/or granite and I'll tell you what not to do.


[This message has been edited by eric (edited January 17, 2006).]

Thanks for all the help, Eric if you will please email your phone number to me at dwa2201@bellsouth.net Thanks everyone.