If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art

On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 19:24:57 +0000, Arthur Shapiro wrote:

If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art

Keep it simple: Install molding and don't caulk. If you need to remove
molding for whatever purpose later, you may have to deal with removing
caulk.

Unless you plan to flood the bathroom floor, I wouldn't bother with caulk
there either.

On Aug 29, 2:24 pm, (Arthur Shapiro) wrote:
If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art


When you dont have carpeting to hide the floor-to-base gap then use a
base shoe and a baseboard. First install the baseboard level all
around the room starting in contact with the highest point of the
floor. Then brad shoot on 3/4 inch x 1/2 inch base shoe so that it
follows tightly the contour of the floor and hides the gap. Base shoe
is cheap and worth the tight look it gives against hard non-carpeted
floors, and eliminates any need to scribe the base bottom to follow
floor dips for a tight fit.

As others said, there is NO need for caulk in any pro trim work. The
only exception being if the trim is being nailed to stucco or some
deeply textured surface that creates un-scribeable gaps. No good trim
carpenter will resort to caulk otherwise.

Arthur Shapiro wrote:
If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

In our house whoever did the tile job in the bathroom just ran it up the
wall about 3-4 inches in lieu of baseboard.

Chris

RickH wrote:

As others said, there is NO need for caulk in any pro trim work.

I believe the OP was discussing caulk for waterproofing, not for gap-hiding.

Chris

Arthur Shapiro wrote:
If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art

I would put caulk all the way around any tile floor. There is always
potential for water - from spills, plumbing leak or mopping - so it
protects the molding from being wet. Especially in baths, condensation
forms on walls/doors and can run down to bottom. Since the face of
baseboards is normally all that is finished, any water that gets under
it can be soaked in by the wood and cause the paint to loosen. If you
notice bathroom or exterior doors, there is almost always some warping
and/or cracking along bottom edge from moisture.

We had a washer hose break in laundry room off the kitchen, and had
about 1" of water in kitchen. Good deal of it flowed into dining room
(tile) but went no further because dining room had fairly new tile and I
had caulked all around. Given that the floor isn't perfectly level, it
didn't flow to the doorways of dining room but would have likely gone
under the d.r. wall into bedroom. One of our best investments has been
a wet-vac - getting all the water up right away when the kitchen was
flooded helped keep our new cabinets from being ruined.

franz frippl wrote:

On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 19:24:57 +0000, Arthur Shapiro wrote:


If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art


Keep it simple: Install molding and don't caulk. If you need to remove
molding for whatever purpose later, you may have to deal with removing
caulk.

Unless you plan to flood the bathroom floor, I wouldn't bother with caulk
there either.

Plan for a toilet to run over and you will be glad that you caulked. )

On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 19:24:57 GMT, (Arthur
Shapiro) wrote:

If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art

A quarter-round molding will hide any unsightly spacing. I used
caulking in the bathroom (vinyl flooring) to keep things cleaner if
there are ever any overflows or backups, but it is optional.

"Chris Friesen" wrote in message
...
Arthur Shapiro wrote:
If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put
any sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer
differ if the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get
wet, as opposed to a living room?

In our house whoever did the tile job in the bathroom just ran it up the
wall about 3-4 inches in lieu of baseboard.

Chris

That is the way I always do it, run a tile, or a 3 to 4 inch slice off extra
floor tiles glued and grouted instead of a wood baseboard. Always looks
better and will help keep any water contained. Keep the grout lines on the
tile baseboard in alignment with the floor grout lines to make it
professional looking.

On Aug 29, 3:30 pm, Chris Friesen wrote:
RickH wrote:
As others said, there is NO need for caulk in any pro trim work.

I believe the OP was discussing caulk for waterproofing, not for gap-hiding.

Chris

In that case I'd use bullnosed tiles to make the base, then an acrylic
sanded caulk in the crotch that matches the grout. No wood.

On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 20:50:09 +0000, Phisherman wrote:

On Wed, 29 Aug 2007 19:24:57 GMT, (Arthur
Shapiro) wrote:

If one is replacing baseboard in a room with tile floors, should one put any
sort of caulking at the baseboard/floor junction? Would the answer differ if
the room was a bathroom, where the floor will presumably get wet, as opposed
to a living room?

Thanks for any advice...the carpeting was replaced with tile some embarrasing
time back, and I really should do something about these molding-less rooms!

Art

A quarter-round molding will hide any unsightly spacing. I used
caulking in the bathroom (vinyl flooring) to keep things cleaner if
there are ever any overflows or backups, but it is optional.



Ultimate question isn't so much about water as it is about appearance.
Can you really caulk a bathroom perimeter and make it look good? Most
caulk jobs I've seen look like the cobbled together mess they are.

Again, keep it simple. The best preventative for toilet overflow is
showing everyone where shutoff valve is located and make certain it isn't
frozen open or difficult to turn.