Thanks to everyone who posts info here. This is a great resource for the DIY'ers.

My situation is I have a new(2 years old) house. It's a "Huntington Homes
of Vermont" modular home on the coast in the Northeast. It's very humid in the summer.

I'm looking at installing 1/2" engineered ash over 3/4" T+G plywood. This is the first floor, above grade with a basement below. The basement gets a little moist in the summer. All in all, I'm paranoid about the moisture issues which is why we decided to go with engineered.

This will be a staple down install.

Am I correct in thinking that all I need is 15# felt on top of the plywood? Since it's a staple down, poly does me no good, correct?

In the kitchen, I have edge glued vinyl that I'm planning on leaving but still put the 15# felt on top for sound + "feel" issues. Does that sound OK?

This modular home has a "seam" running down the middle of the floor where they bolted 2 sides of the house together. It mostly runs underneath a wall and/or closet but I have a small area where once I pulled up the old carpet, I have a 1" void down to the beam below. I intend to jam as much solid wood as I can into that void but I was wondering if there is a recomended type of fill that would handle the staples?

One more question, is a de-humidifier a requirement for the basement? The basement is walk down with no bulkhead if that matters.

Thanks in advance for the help.

Sean

Does anyone know of another website where I can post my questions?

I'm looking for a site that has flooring professionals with enough knowledge/experience to help with my situation.

This site is a bust.

Thanks

I'm not a pro but Ill try you help a little and maybe a real installer will help too.



I'm in the process of putting staple down engineered flooring in my house right now. My BR-111 requires a 6 mil poly layer no matter what you decide to put overtop or how it's attached. I used red rosin paper but most of the pros use 15 lb felt. I don't think you would notice a "feel" difference on your vinyl but you still need the vapor layer as vinyl is not an approved vapor layer. Warranty is what you are worried about so don’t void it.



Well if you are going across (perpendicular) the seam and it is flat you should not need to fill the void. If you are going parallel to the seam I would think as long as the staple line is not going into the void you would be ok. If it does I would use 1/2 plywood and sandwich it into the seam with some construction glue to hold it in place.



If you basement feels moist then you should have a dehumidifier for sure. Basements hold moisture bad enough let alone a damp one. Think about black mold in the future and you will want to prevent it now by keeping it dry.

Now maybe the experts can chime in on my diy answers.

BTW this is a very good site for info but sometimes you need to bump your post as the people who give answers are most likely running a business and are short on time. In other words...some post get missed.