Hi

Is it OK to lay cork or maybe vinyl tiles directly onto flooring grade chipboard?

Also, the floor (newly laid) is in a bathroom, so should I prepare the surface to protect from possible water damage, and if so what with? The cork tiles will be well sealed afterwards, but I want to be on the safe side. I know that you have to be careful with PVA as it's not compatible with some adhesives - as might be used for the tiles.

I had thought about laying hardboard as a base, but as the chipboard is nice and smooth apart from a couple of bad joins (which would be filled), it seemes that hardboard would be unnecessary.
But if you must use hardboard, how would you fix it to the chipboard? I imagine that nails or screws could pull out of the chipboard after a while - even ring nails?

One final question: any advice on what to use to fill the gaps between the chipboard? Two of the 'gaps' are where the top of the groove of the board have been broken off leaving a 'channel' .... don't ask!!

Any advice or suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for the reply Steve   ... I'll look into what you suggested.

Do you also have any idea what can be used to prepare the chipboard (if it's necessary) before laying cork tiles? ... I've heard that you can use a diluted mix of PVA but I've also read somewhere that PVA is incompatible with some adhesives.

Cheers
Nuthatch

Thanks again Steve for your reply.
Got the tiles and the adhesive now. Instructions on both just say to use a "suitable primer" on porous surfaces like chipboard, but don't say what, so I'm going with the PVA diluting it with 4 parts water. I'm sure it will be OK .... fingers crossed.
Just coming into your busy season now eh Steve .... boiler services, central heating systems packed up and all that .... so hope you're getting plenty of work.

Cheers
Nuthatch