Preserving its charm – but safely
The old subfloor above the ceiling joists was largely able to be retained, and it was decided to sand it and replace only very few of the wooden floorboards. The owner made a conscious decision not to use filling or levelling compounds – in the interest of retaining the characteristic features of this type of substrate. After reconditioning the subfloor, twelve-millimetre thick ESB panels were bonded to the surface using STAUF SPU 460. This 1-component wood flooring adhesive can be used on virtually all substrates without the need for a primer. The next stage was to bond (9 mm) STAUF decoupling boards on top of this layer. These boards provide greater installation reliability on unstable substrates and at the same time mechanically decouple the substrate and help to insulate noise. STAUF SPU 460 was also used for this task.
‘Piecing together’ the herringbone pattern
On this Tuesday in early March it is raining in the old Hanseatic city. The floors of the four upper storeys of the building are scattered with piles of restored old parquet or floorboards. These piles are made up of oak strip parquet (22 mm) and solid pitch pine floorboards which have been planed down to 16 millimetres from their previous 25 mm-thickness. On the second floor, joiner Christoph Daniels is arranging the old parquet strips in a herringbone pattern on the floor – to ascertain where each strip can be used. The parquet strips are then bonded in place by Daniels and his colleague Felix Lieberts with STAUF SPU 460. Later, the two men will sand and oil the floor – but, before that, they have several hours of installation work ahead of them. They will lay a total of 500 square metres of parquet and floorboards in the four flats. In June, they should have completed their work in the handsome residence. But in the meantime, the men will continue to enjoy the beautiful view of the canal and the trees – at least in their breaks – before the first tenants move in.
