UKC

Well work on the Vito camper has at last been started! Rather than a ply and lino floor I was thinking pine tongue and groove raised on ply battons. Has any one else tried this and if so what thickness wood did you use?
Thanks!

In reply to Tigger:

I went for walnut flooring in cut t&g form. A little pricey and heavy, but set the standard for the rest of the build. A big gamble at the time, but I have absolutely no regrets now. I think pine might be too soft and get damaged easily, which will probably be a source of annoyance for you after a year or so.

In reply to gribble:

I think I'll stick with pine mainly due to cost, a few dent will only add character do you think 15mm will be ok?

In reply to Tigger:

At 15mm I'd put the Battons close together. Perhaps 300mm centres. Pine does shrink and expand more than hardwoods so I'd make sure you get the moisture content right before laying and seal both sides of the boards.

Something engineered might be less hastle?

In reply to Tigger:

I think pine would be fine, the back of a van isn't exactly a highly trafficked area. I'd consider laying it direct onto rigid insulation, say 25mm thick, then just gluing the t&g joints, rather than have it laid on battens, so it's like a floating 'plate' with soft joints at the perimeter for movement. For the timber itself, I'd use >20mm.

In reply to Fraser:

That's a good idea. It'll be much warmer. My campervan has a floor of some kind of laminated board that looks like wood. Easy to clean and pretty durable. Pine's quite soft.

In reply to Tigger:


Cheap T&G cladding will tend to be plain-sawn and is likely to distort quite a lot in a campervan. I tried using some as bulkhead lining in a boat and it looked awful after a few weeks. I gave up and went for stained and varnished plywood in the end.

Why not laminate it with some thin ply? You could call it 'engineered flooring' and will be more stable and stiff and you could save a bit on the battens.