We are looking to replace the flooring in out living room, dining room
and kitchen with ceramic tile. Does anyone know if there is a problem a
piano's weight on ceramic tiles? Is there a best practice for putting
it down to reduce/eliminate cracking? This would be installed on the
first floor over wood joists.

Thanks
Ken

wrote in message
oups.com...
We are looking to replace the flooring in out living room, dining room
and kitchen with ceramic tile. Does anyone know if there is a problem a
piano's weight on ceramic tiles? Is there a best practice for putting
it down to reduce/eliminate cracking? This would be installed on the
first floor over wood joists.

Thanks
Ken


You need a backer board to lessen or eliminate the flexing. How much is
needed will be determined by the construction of the floor. Joist sizes are
different so I can't tell what you have. Talk to your dealer about it.
There may be simple ways of distributing the weight of the piano also.

Is tile good for bad for the acoustics of a piano?

Thanks for the info. We have 2x10 16oc joists. I was figuring that we
would need a backer board. Of course, we don't want to have to do the
whole area with the backer board. Would it be feasible to put the
backer board only in the general area where the piano would be? Using a
thinner underlayment so that the 'base' flooring would be the same
thickness?

As for acoustics, tile and other hard flooring just make the room more
acoustically 'live'. This can be countered with curtain and other wall
coverings.

wrote:

We are looking to replace the flooring in out living room, dining room
and kitchen with ceramic tile. Does anyone know if there is a problem a
piano's weight on ceramic tiles? Is there a best practice for putting
it down to reduce/eliminate cracking? This would be installed on the
first floor over wood joists.

I (well the tile guy) replaced my kitchen and dining room with porcelain
tile, as it was recommended as stronger than plain ceramic tiles.

Yes, best practice calls for an underlayment for the tile, as well as
thin set mortar to set the tiles in. In my case, the floor had a layer
of furring strips, which had to be replaced with plywood, before putting
the tile underlayment board down.

Porcelain for floors, ceramic for walls is what I was told.

"avallk" wrote in message
oups.com...
Thanks for the info. We have 2x10 16oc joists. I was figuring that we
would need a backer board. Of course, we don't want to have to do the
whole area with the backer board.

It would be a standard practice to do the whole area with backerboard, if
you don't do a wet bed.

And definitely use porcelain tiles, like the other comment suggests.


Would it be feasible to put the
backer board only in the general area where the piano would be? Using a
thinner underlayment so that the 'base' flooring would be the same
thickness?

As for acoustics, tile and other hard flooring just make the room more
acoustically 'live'. This can be countered with curtain and other wall
coverings.