I've tried to find this installation problem in the existing postings, but can't seem to find it, so I thought I'd try a new post...

I am installing an engineered floor on a combination of concrete slab in one room and tile in the hallway. The flooring is even enough, but the transition between the hallway and the room has a 1 1/8" downwards slant in the doorway area over just a 6" run. I think that I can shim the slant with some material (perhaps a sanded pressure treated 2 x 8 sleeper, and screw down into the tile/concrete), but the transition would be a 1 1/8" step-down.

I could put plywood throughout the room to bring it up to 1 1/8" with one sheet of 1/2" over another sheet of 5/8", but I'd rather not incur that expense, inconvenience, time, and sound difference just to avoid a single, door-sized step. What transition options are there for this? The current construction has the tile slanted downwards, which just looks cheap and bad.

Finally, if I can accomplish this, we have another room adjoining the hallway that has a large, curved incline starting about 8" to the wall and climbing 3"! Any ideas on how to floor a room like this? All I can come up with is a heck of a lot of floor leveling compound.

Any help is very, very, and did I say very appreciated? Thanks.

My first question upon seeing that would be if it was intentional, or if it is a symptom of a bigger problem.

It looks to be intentional--the house was built in 1906 and, San Francisco earthquake jokes aside, had these two rooms added on, on a concrete slab. Certainly my excavations have shown no signs of a larger problem, the inspectors didn't see any issues, and the previous owners have shown (through their other projects) a lot of short cuts, like four (!) separate subflooring layers in the upstairs rooms (that was a LOT of work to clean up and turn into an even 3/4" hardwood floor).

The slab is stable and moisture does not seem to be a problem. I just need to deal with the 1 1/8" step that the room transition will create.

In that case I think I'd see if a stair nose might do the trick. I don't think any traditional transitions will accomodate a step like that. If not stair nose, maybe you can get something custom milled that will work.