Particleboard subfloors..... new carpet

shop deals on amazon
SpartanEpoxies
Advertise with us
House Repair Talk

Help Support House Repair Talk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
shan2themax

shan2themax

Supporting Member
Supporting Member
Joined
May 31, 2007
Messages
1,114
Reaction score
1,334
Location
Proctorville, Ohio
So, my subfloor are particle board, they are stained from whatever grossness. I had planned to put osb down over top of them for a clean surface. However, with all the things I need to do around here I am left wondering....
Why could I not just leave it as is, put down knew roofing paper (or something similar and get new padding and carpet?
I have some paint that if for painting over stains and smells (including smoke)... so, why not just do that?
Give me the cons, I have no intentions of moving/selling. I am on track to have the house paid off in 2031, and I am saddled with 68k in student loans.
Other things that are absolutely necessary: new windows, new siding, gix sag in center of house, new flooring/patching in dining room out to screened in back porch, repair of screened in back porch, repair of some rot on (rim joist? Not sure if proper term), kitchen remodel, new drywall at least on lower 4 feet of drywall throughout house, and 1 room ceiling redrywalled, 1/2 bath ceiling repair, I don't have carpet tack strips or baseboards throughout house and I have 2 holes that need repaired that use to be return air vents, and I need the metal part of the air vents replaced in multiple rooms because the floor is crumbling Round them and they didn't replace around them like I asked (obviously I would have to replace at least there).... so hit me up with all the why should I put all new subfloor down (other than around vents).... also, I am 51 if that matters to anyone.
 
You could paint them with Zinser BIN or KILZ to seal in any smells like smoke in them. I don't see any advantage to roofing felt under carpet pad. If there are pet stains you might want to treat that first with Natures Miracle or similar product let dry and then paint it. What is below the particle board? Particle board by itself isn't a great underlayment.
 
Go for it seal them up and get the carpet down.

I had a laundry room where the previous owners had kept cats. The walls were plywood and I was close to calling in the hazmat team. A old guy was helping me and he told me to go get a gallon of old time oil based varnish. He went to town in the room and almost killed both of us with the fumes for a few days but when it dried up the smells were gone and I painted the room. Not saying I recommend the varnish but it worked. I wasn't living here at the time.
 
Zinser BIN is what I have. I'm not sure what is under the particleboard, I know there is a black barrier and I feel like it was thin plywood. Like not even quite a 1/2" . There is a lot of water damage, wegher it is from pets or kids or whatever idk. The people that owned the house before me had a large dog and children too, maybe even a cat or 2..... and my mom had plenty of cats T one point. Biggest reason I would like to cut off the bottom 4 feet and have it redrywalled. I actually would just like to gut it a d start over, but that is unrealistic.
 
If the lower drywall is still reasonably sound one approach might be to cover the lower half (or third to make ceiling look higher) with thin brownboard or whiteboard and adding half inch thick wood or MDF rails and stiles to get a recessed panel look (spacing the stiles to cover any joints). Then paint all the same color. It might be cheaper than beadboard. Inner trim molding optional. It would look OK without it.

edit: Maybe the lower wainscoting rail would cover any drywall damage so no brownboard or whiteboard needed and greatly simplify the project.

1667868846667.png
 
Last edited:
When a neighbor had a major fire about 20 years ago the rebuilder painted all the wood that was retained in the rebuilding with Zinser BIN to seal in the smoke smell. In the rebuilding process they stripped everything back to bare studs and replaced anything that was charred, and replaced the wiring, plumbing, insulation, etc.
 
Although wainscoting can look quite good in a dining or living room, if the goal is to have a clean surface, I would go for the re-drywalling as I suspect that is lower effort overall. From my experience, getting all those corners and edges tightly siliconed, primed and painted will quite a bit time.

Regarding the floor though, I agree with was said about using a sealing primer *as long as it structurally sound*. You also have the advantage that you're installing carpet over it anyway. If you find that you do need to change the subfloor as some point, the carpet and padding can be reused, but would be much harder to do with wood or plank flooring.
 
Drywall demolition, disposal and replacement can be a messy undertaking plus joint taping and mudding can prove to be a daunting experience for the DIYer.

For sealing the floor some bargain (color mistake) enamel might do the job.
 
Eddie_T said:
Drywall demolition, disposal and replacement can be a messy undertaking plus joint taping and mudding can prove to be a daunting experience for the DIYer.

For sealing the floor some bargain (color mistake) enamel might do the job.
Click to expand...
I was looking at the mis-mixed paint at Lowe's the other day, not much of a bargain on the price. Years ago I got a 5 gallon bucket of a sand/tan paint for my garage that way, it was pretty cheap. But paint has gotten really expensive the past few years.
 
I haven't been there for several years but the Habitat store used to have leftover pain from some of their projects for a pretty good price.
 
Sparky617 said:
I was looking at the mis-mixed paint at Lowe's the other day, not much of a bargain on the price. Years ago I got a 5 gallon bucket of a sand/tan paint for my garage that way, it was pretty cheap. But paint has gotten really expensive the past few years.
Click to expand...
Where I retired from we built locomotives and the had a salvage yard where all the scrap and waste got processed. They would get locomotive paint in full or part full 5 gallon cans in all the bright locomotive colors you see around the world. The black Imron stuff for the undercarriage would go fast when they would get some. All paint was $1 per gallon for employees. I had a friend that bought a pickup load of cans one time and took them home and mixed them all together in a 55 gallon drum and came up with a butterscotch color full drum. He put it in some gallon cans and gave me one that I used on a few things.



I went over to his house one time and started laughing. His wife’s car his truck his trailer his shed his barn even his mailbox. Everything was butterscotch. He had a couple butterscotch bikes in the garage and riding mowers and push mowers everything that could be painted was except for the aluminum siding on his house and the wife drew the line.



Free paint is great. From time to time I would see a Burlington Northern Green truck around the city and I knew where he worked. I always wanted to paint my truck BNSF orange but never did
 
Eddie_T said:
I haven't been there for several years but the Habitat store used to have leftover pain from some of their projects for a pretty good price.
Click to expand...
Ours did as well, though I think it was donated paint. They blended the interior latex paints together and sold it by the gallon or 5 gallon bucket. My real estate agent wife got a bunch of paint a client left in their house. I did the same thing with all of it that wasn't bad and came up with a light gray paint. I used it in my shop. I may combine some of the paint I have from around the house for repainting my garage. Depending on the dominate color in your mix you'll either get a tan or gray color.
 
Back when paint was cheap I walked into a paint store and told the kid on duty that I was looking for $1/gal mis-mix paint. He said they didn't have any. I told him to go ask the manager. He came back with a $3/gal. Sometimes they have some in the back room.
 
Eddie_T said:
I haven't been there for several years but the Habitat store used to have leftover pain from some of their projects for a pretty good price.
Click to expand...
Habitat used to be in the building behind my garage and now the new owner of the building mixes up paint in 5 gallon buckets, puts a dab on top to show the final color, and sells it... I think he tries to combine paints of a similar color... don't know if he separates latex from oil-based... I need to ask him...
 
shan2themax said:
So, my subfloor are particle board, they are stained from whatever grossness.
Click to expand...
I'd prolly quickly wash the floor, suck up the grime almost dry with a shop vac, let it dry, then coat it with something to harden the surface of and seal the particle board... as Sparky mentioned, particle board isn't the greatest subfloor material...
 
BuzzLOL said:
Habitat used to be in the building behind my garage and now the new owner of the building mixes up paint in 5 gallon buckets, puts a dab on top to show the final color, and sells it... I think he tries to combine paints of a similar color... don't know if he separates latex from oil-based... I need to ask him...
Click to expand...
I'd be surprised if oil and latex paint mixed well. Oil and water and all that....
 
I think I have decided that I am just going to paint the floors with the Zep BIN. There will be a couple of places that I should replace because of the crumbling of the particle board. I also need to get the holes (where the previous return air vents were) patch, I just have wood covering them.

Well, I'm off to get ready for work.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top