Second-storey Floor Construction Alternatives

[RY12]

This is a basic question demonstrating my ignorance of construction, but what do Thais do for second-storey floors besides poured concrete? Besides plywood resting on joists, or wood planks, which I imagine is expensive and termite-prone, I don't know what else there is, but I assume there's alternatives?

For myself, I'm just thinking of a shed-like one-storey house with a small attic you can walk around in, so I need a cheap load-bearing floor that perferably wouldn't be wood. This results in more questions- do the roof trusses then have to be wood so the flooring can be fasted to it? (I assume it's hard to fasten materials to steel trusses or expensive to drill holes). I guess I could just throw some corrugated metal sheets up there and walk on them... but it'd be nice if there was a single product I could use that would pass as both the attic floor AND the first floor ceiling (I don't care if the truss joists are exposed on the ceiling below).

[Rimmer]

When you tie the sow poons together around the top of the house use steel welded into the core of the sow poon. Your builder will probably do that anyway. Then use steel C section for main joists and fill in with a lighter grade of C section for your floor supports.

You can buy cement board sheets up to 1" that will easily support a floor, lay those across the steel joists and secure using the C Pack screws. If you are not familier with the C Pack screw they have a drill bit on the sharp end with two small tags that make a slightly larger hole in the board then break off when they hit the steel. The screw then drills and taps right into the steel and then countersinks itself in the cement board. They are very easy to use and will give you a fast one stop floor.

Use the small B850 Maktec high speed power drills that they use for cielings.

I built a pool deck using the same method, easy, ant proof and very strong.

[jojothai]

This is a basic question demonstrating my ignorance of construction, but what do Thais do for second-storey floors besides poured concrete? Besides plywood resting on joists, or wood planks, which I imagine is expensive and termite-prone, I don't know what else there is, but I assume there's alternatives?

For myself, I'm just thinking of a shed-like one-storey house with a small attic you can walk around in, so I need a cheap load-bearing floor that perferably wouldn't be wood. This results in more questions- do the roof trusses then have to be wood so the flooring can be fasted to it? (I assume it's hard to fasten materials to steel trusses or expensive to drill holes). I guess I could just throw some corrugated metal sheets up there and walk on them... but it'd be nice if there was a single product I could use that would pass as both the attic floor AND the first floor ceiling (I don't care if the truss joists are exposed on the ceiling below).

What Rimmer said is correct. I am going to do similar.

You still need to put a ceiling underneath unless you want all the work showing.

You need to get either conwood or shera cement floor panels. Shera is cheaper. You should get the shera 1.2 x 2.4 m "Flooring board" comes 15mm and 18mm thick depends on your load.

Ensure that you consider what loading you anticipate. Check the loading allowed in the supplier guides. Light boxes of old junk may not be very heavy but If you are going to put heavier items such as boxes of old paperwork records that is different. The load will determine your main joist spacing. Depending on the load intended you may even have to consider the 25mm thick conwood floor planks.

One problem you will find is that Supports need to be at 600mmm centers (so you can do a grid of 0.6 x 1.2m or less). Your main support joists then are at the 1.2 m or less, you need somebody to check span allowed for the size of the steel C section used.

Then you can use timber or steel to support at 600mm, since we dont want the timber then steel purlins are a good solution. But note the supports should have a minimum width 38 mm for fixing at joints. (That is why all the similar ceiling panels are normally fitted on a grid of 75mmx 38mm timber)

There are installation guides you can get from shera and conwood. Try the shera data on mahaphant.com. When I tried before I could not download and I had to telephone them to get the guide. I dont have my copy to hand at present.

regards

jojothai

[jojothai]

When I tried before I could not download and I had to telephone them to get the guide. I dont have my copy to hand at present.

regards

jojothai

Just had time to check around where the documenet was and found it. Here is the document

InstallationFlooringEng.pdf

jojo