Browse Forums Flooring & Floor Covering 1 Mar 17, 2010 11:04 am A little over 6 years ago we moved into a beautifully renovated 1920's single-storey weatherboard Edwardian in Melbourne's inner North. The 'old' part of the home (4 bedrooms) is carpeted, even up the central hallway, which is a bit unusual. We always knew the floor underneath was a bit d0dgy, as it squeaked and creaked a lot underfoot. The ~15yo extension at the rear of the home (kitchen/dining/lounge) however has gorgeous timber floors, we're pretty sure it's 80mm select-grade brushbox. We recently decided to add an upstairs extension, so have removed the hallway wall of the front bedroom, to open it up for the stairs, and the rest will be used as a formal sitting room/study. We're also thinking about replacing the hallway carpet, and the carpet in the new study/stairs room with timber floors, and obviously want to match what we currently have, as closely as possible anyway. The area we want to replace works out to about 32sqm, split almost equally between the hallway/alcoves and the old bedroom. Any thoughts from this forum on gotcha's, do's/don't's, that sort of thing? I rang a timber flooring place for a brief discussion, and was suprised to hear that select grade brushbox would be around $100 per sqm supplied, and $170 per sqm for supply and install. Does this sound right, and if so, are there cheaper options that might be made to blend in with the existing floors? Also any recommendations for installers in Melbourne? Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 2Mar 17, 2010 11:25 am Sounds about right. I reckon that the cheapest for Select grade of Brushbox (solid and unfinished timber) would be 80 per m2. Installers will usually quote around $30-40 per m2 to install and the same amount of money for sanding/finishing it. DIY would be the most effective way to achieve some significant savings. Based on the numbers you provided there seems to be an opportunity to save $10-20 per m2, however, considering the area in question is only 32m2 the overall saving is not that huge to justify spending a lot of time on finding a cheaper option.. ... built a Promenade with Clarendon. viewtopic.php?f=31&t=25104 20-10-09 - excavation and piering completed ... 12-04-10 - Basins fixed. Connecting to the electrical grid 23-04-10 - PCI 07-05-10 - HANDOVER! Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 3Mar 17, 2010 9:43 pm Juz, I won't be much help in terms of advice changing to all floorboards. I think you're CRAZY! You already have floorboards in the newer section. In Melbourne, why the hell would you want a house with all floorboards? I'd suggest doing the renos, and plan to install beautiful wool carpets in that section to complement the Edwardian style of the home. This is my opinion, and I have a number of very good reasons for having it! Ash. Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 4Mar 18, 2010 7:05 am What about just restoring the floorboards already in the house? In an 80 yo house - the floors could be nice wide Baltic Pine or maybe Cypress? Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 5Mar 18, 2010 7:37 am Hi juzdownunder I can't figure if the 2 areas are adjacent to each other or not? If they are, are you planning to sand and polish the 15-year old timber as well? Otherwise, the floors may not match that well. If they are not adjacent, maybe you could even put a similar, but cheaper timber if the cost is a really big factor (but I can't imagine it would be worth it, considering it's only a small area). Also, the smaller the area, the more they would charge per m2. My signature is distracting people from my wise posts ... Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 6Mar 18, 2010 1:58 pm Thanks for the replies. I'll try to answer a few questions here: Yes, the areas are adjacent, our front door leads into a 12m long hallway, past 4 bedrooms, as well as the bathroom/toilet/laundry. The hallway ends at the extension that was done 15 years ago (open plan kitchen/dining/lounge). As it stands, the entire hallway and all of the bedrooms are carpeted. The extension has floorboards. We're using one of the 4 bedrooms to become the room for the stairs, so have removed the wall between it and the hallway. So now we think it would look great to replace the carpets in the hallway, and the "stairs room" with floorboards. So Lex, yes they're adjacent, where the hallway and old extension meet. And royalblue/Ash, we're not planning on replacing the carpet in the other 3 bedrooms. We're also planning on carpeting the upstairs extension (2 bedrooms, 8x4m rumpus and bathroom). Well except the bathroom of course! That being said, i'd love to hear your reasons for keeping the hall/study as carpet? Always looking for different thinking.... Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 7Mar 18, 2010 1:59 pm namtrak What about just restoring the floorboards already in the house? In an 80 yo house - the floors could be nice wide Baltic Pine or maybe Cypress? We considered that, but unfortunately not, it seems someone, at some stage, replaced the original floor with boring old MDF or some such, and even that's a mess.... Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 8Mar 18, 2010 9:26 pm juzdownunder And royalblue/Ash, we're not planning on replacing the carpet in the other 3 bedrooms. We're also planning on carpeting the upstairs extension (2 bedrooms, 8x4m rumpus and bathroom). Well except the bathroom of course! That being said, i'd love to hear your reasons for keeping the hall/study as carpet? Always looking for different thinking.... Cheers! If you have other areas that are carpeted well fine. Its hard to say from just descriptions how it all will work together, and its your choice which surfaces best work for you. Its just that from your initial post, I had visions of a home being turned into a mass of floorboards wity no carpets! I've been to Melbourne about 6 times, and its always been bloody cold! As attractive as floorboards are, I could not live in a cool climate without the warmth of nice carpets. A home (in my book) would have a combination of carefully chosen hard surfaces and quality carpets in other areas, with careful consideration of how the various rooms and areas are used. Here are some reasons; COMFORT UNDER FOOT: The words "comfort" and "home" should be synonamous! Carpets are pleasant to live with, lie on and forgiving in the event of falling, dropping things etc. THERMAL INSULATION: In winter, a lot of heat gets lost through hard floors. Quality carpets and underlay makes huge improvements to your home's thermal efficiency, and can seriously reduce your heating costs. ACOUSTIC INSULATION: Think carefully about this!.... noise transmitted around the house can be a pain! Kids, tv's music etc. Carpets should be a part of you strategy to make your home friendly, so noises are not bouncing around from one zone to another. ATTRACTIVE & STYLISH: There are some magnificent quality carpets that are more cost effective than spending lots of money on timber floorboards. You can create some beautifula and unique decor features with carpets. WHY PAY TWICE?.... I see lots of people pay a fortune for floorboards, then they place big rugs over the floorboards! So they are paying big $ for floorboards only to cover them up!!! Its better to choose which floorcoverings are best for each zone, and go with that. There are other reasons too, but that's a start! Ash. Re: Looking for advice on switching from carpet to timber fl 9Mar 21, 2010 11:50 pm Couple of extra considerations specifically about the study area... Are you operating a home business or will be speaking with customers on the phone from this area? If its all hard surfaces, it can be a bit like a cave, and the acoustics can come across on the phone. Also, castor chairs can scratch the hell out of the surface of floorboards. There are only certain floorcoverings that perform well where castor chairs are used. Ash. That could be a piece of timber that was mistakenly attached to the formwork. Any reduction in concrete section is a concern. 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