Okay, not that I'm qualified to write something on hearth building, but here are some pictures of the hearth I built. There were a few ups and downs. Particularly the floor in the house. Previous water damage and a poor re-finish job has left the floor with numerous little dips and bends everywhere. Couple that with some fine Home Cheapo lumber, and it's a recipie for disaster. So as you can see, there are many shims underneath the frame. Oh, and that little triangle off to the left, I did end up re-framing that and tieing it in properly, but unfortunately I did not take a picture of that, so no worries my work is not that shoddy. Originally I only intended to have the square portion, then decided it would be better just to run the hearth into the corner, that's why I did not build one frame.
Notice that the hole in the floor was drilled twice. Off to the left I ran into the floor joist below, so I moved over and drilled to the right for the final cut. Although the hole for the OAK is only 3 1/8" I drilled a 4" hole in the floor. This was done to accomodate the body of the drill as I drilled each layer of wonderboard from below, just scoring from below, not trying to drill through. Then I would move upstairs, score again with the hole saw, then knock out the plug with a hammer. But of course before the wonderboard I installed a 3/4 layer of plywood.
Working with the wonderboard was okay overall. It cuts like drywall for the most part, but did eat the blade on my utility knife. Of course, I did alternate the pattern on the numerous layers so as not to have any of the same joints from one layer to the next. Two observations of note... one, that despite buying the special screws the stuff still likes to pop up and dimple sometimes. I ended up just tappng the dimples flat with a hammer, no big deal, but something to be aware of. The second observation is that working with it will make your hands dry out fast!
After 5 layers of wonderboard I placed some scrap plywood around the frame to outline the eventual over all dimension. I then thinset mortered the joint and the edges. The border also allowed me to place the tile spacers right up against the plywood to give me the proper tile spacing prior to the final oak border.
The tile was a breeze. I used 3/16" spacers and charcoal grout. The little saw I purchased worked very well. I even cut the hole with the tile saw from the back side, then finishing up with a special tile blade on the jig saw. Then a tile file to smooth the edges of the hole. Not a perfect hole, but I feel okay overall. Where the tile had been eaten away slightly on the back side, I just placed some extra thinset there to shore up around the hole. By the way, the 4 pieces of tape on the tiles represent the legs of the stove. Just making sure the stove legs wouldn't be right over a joint.
Now I simply used thinset mortar to secure the tiles. After the tiles set up I removed the rubber spacers and the temporary border then trimmed out in solid oak. I decided to use oak counter top instead of quarter round at the base because the counter edge moulding did a little more to break up the height of the hearth. The overall height of the hearth is roughly 7 1/2 inches.
Stained the oak border with a natural stain, and 3 coats of polyurathane after that. I then simply used grout to fill in the tiles and the border edge. That's it! Still need to trim out the back edge of the hearth, but before I do that I need to finish the drywall behind and paint.
Thanks to everyone for all the help and advice given during this whole process. If anyone has any questions I'd be happy to answer them.
-Kevin
(broken link removed)
EDIT: I don't know why the post always places the pictures in reverse order!
Notice that the hole in the floor was drilled twice. Off to the left I ran into the floor joist below, so I moved over and drilled to the right for the final cut. Although the hole for the OAK is only 3 1/8" I drilled a 4" hole in the floor. This was done to accomodate the body of the drill as I drilled each layer of wonderboard from below, just scoring from below, not trying to drill through. Then I would move upstairs, score again with the hole saw, then knock out the plug with a hammer. But of course before the wonderboard I installed a 3/4 layer of plywood.
Working with the wonderboard was okay overall. It cuts like drywall for the most part, but did eat the blade on my utility knife. Of course, I did alternate the pattern on the numerous layers so as not to have any of the same joints from one layer to the next. Two observations of note... one, that despite buying the special screws the stuff still likes to pop up and dimple sometimes. I ended up just tappng the dimples flat with a hammer, no big deal, but something to be aware of. The second observation is that working with it will make your hands dry out fast!
After 5 layers of wonderboard I placed some scrap plywood around the frame to outline the eventual over all dimension. I then thinset mortered the joint and the edges. The border also allowed me to place the tile spacers right up against the plywood to give me the proper tile spacing prior to the final oak border.
The tile was a breeze. I used 3/16" spacers and charcoal grout. The little saw I purchased worked very well. I even cut the hole with the tile saw from the back side, then finishing up with a special tile blade on the jig saw. Then a tile file to smooth the edges of the hole. Not a perfect hole, but I feel okay overall. Where the tile had been eaten away slightly on the back side, I just placed some extra thinset there to shore up around the hole. By the way, the 4 pieces of tape on the tiles represent the legs of the stove. Just making sure the stove legs wouldn't be right over a joint.
Now I simply used thinset mortar to secure the tiles. After the tiles set up I removed the rubber spacers and the temporary border then trimmed out in solid oak. I decided to use oak counter top instead of quarter round at the base because the counter edge moulding did a little more to break up the height of the hearth. The overall height of the hearth is roughly 7 1/2 inches.
Stained the oak border with a natural stain, and 3 coats of polyurathane after that. I then simply used grout to fill in the tiles and the border edge. That's it! Still need to trim out the back edge of the hearth, but before I do that I need to finish the drywall behind and paint.
Thanks to everyone for all the help and advice given during this whole process. If anyone has any questions I'd be happy to answer them.
-Kevin
(broken link removed)
EDIT: I don't know why the post always places the pictures in reverse order!
Great work on the build. I believe that will pass muster 
