Making ants cry uncle in an underground home

Mark Philben — Globe Correspondent

June 8, 2022 8:47 am

Q. We dwell in an underground property and want your assistance. We bought this household six decades back and bravely undertook a gut renovation, out to the concrete walls and down to the sand. We have been too ignorant (and romantic) to assume we could not pull this renovation off, so we did. We are quite happy with the success, except for one challenge: audio regulate. When the flooring was laid, we mounted radiant heat and then poured a polished-concrete ground. The good home is 28 by 28 ft, capped by a concrete dome with a big central oculus skylight. We have drywall about the concrete walls. We consider the concrete floors below the dome are behind the sound challenge. The seem of our grandchildren playing or people today conversing fills the place. We might include new flooring, but we unquestionably want to protect the radiant heat. Would bamboo flooring be a good option? Or cork? Ants have observed their way into the dwelling wherever the growth joints in the ground have unsuccessful. How impermeable do we will need to make the underfloor before incorporating new flooring? Is there a distinct type of skilled who promotions with these elements?

A.S. & C.N.

A. This sounds like a pretty intriguing household with incredibly exceptional issues. Initially, I would be concerned with the ants. The moment they have set up a foothold less than the slab, it could be an problem acquiring rid of them. I would use a urethane caulk manufactured for expansion joints to seal matters up, and then call an exterminator. A excellent method may be to have the perimeter of the residence sprayed once a calendar year.

Pertaining to noise command, anything at all to soak up the seem created rather of it reverberating back again will help. Rugs in decide on regions that address sufficient of the flooring would do much better than any type of wood flooring. If you do decide to include the ground fully to mitigate sound, cork or vinyl-plank flooring are much better than stable wooden, which is thicker and will protect against the heat from radiating as a result of. You would have to be mindful to keep the floor all-around 80 degrees, but no increased. Radiant warmth is seldom established that high, so it ought to not be an situation.

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