getting started with hearth on suspended floor

[bazmdiy]

Hi all - please can anybody give advice on what is normally used as a base when creating a quarry tile hearth for a woodburner?

Plywood, floorboards, steel plate?

I'm ok with laying the tiles - its just the type of base.

The joists span 2 metres and are 9". The quarry tiles are 6"x6" and 1" thick. They will be flush with finished floor.

What would a builder normally choose?

Any ideas welcome!

 

[geraldthehamster]

Hi all - please can anybody give advice on what is normally used as a base when creating a quarry tile hearth for a woodburner?

Plywood, floorboards, steel plate?

I'm ok with laying the tiles - its just the type of base.

The joists span 2 metres and are 9". The quarry tiles are 6"x6" and 1" thick. They will be flush with finished floor.

What would a builder normally choose?

Any ideas welcome!

Dunno what a builder would do, but this is what I did. I have a floor consisting of 4x2 joists suspended above a concrete oversite, supported mid-span by concrete block sleeper walls, 9 inches high (the width of one block). I removed the joist ends where the hearth would go, and added a trimmer to support the ends by connecting them to adjacent joists. To be doubly sure of support (and because I would be kneeling on that area repeatedly to feed the stove), I added some identical blocks from a demolished internal wall, on their sides, to support the cut joists. I then built a platform by mortaring more of the same blocks, on their sides, onto the oversite, with gaps between them such that I could mortar more blocks flat on top, bringing the whole thing level with the tops of the joists. My blocks were 4" thick, same as the joists. As my hearth tiles are 2" thick, they are 1" proud of the surrounding floorboards. I did this in the course of removing all the floorboards to insulate under the floor, sanding and varnishing the boards and putting them back. You can avoid cut ends of floorboard butting up to the front (or side, depending on orientation) of the hearth tiles, by insetting a strip of floorboard parallel to the edge of the hearth, with the ends mitred into the boards running along the sides (or front, depending on orientation). You see this with some Victorian/Edwardian hearths.

Cheers
Richard

 

[bazmdiy]

hi there - thanks for that I can see what you've done but I would not have the luxury of building up from the oversite - the hearth will lie over the remains of a bread oven and I'm not allowed to touch it. I'll maybe post in another forum section - perhaps somebodys done a similar job there.