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Old 04-14-2010, 11:12 AM
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827rotax 827rotax is offline
 
Join Date: Dec 2008
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I have been framing for over 20 years and my own commercial framing business for 13. Price aside OSB is better. Straighter, more rigid, and IMO more resilant to weather. You can span OSB on floors up to 24" on center, let me see you do that with any plywood. Old school plywood with old school glue might have stood a chance. New world new glue, Fir and Spruce delaminates way faster than OSB. I have had no call backs with OSB installation, and could not even count how many with plywood. It literly delaminates and falls apart if left to the elements for any time. I have seen OSB sheathing lay around in the elements for years and it may swell a little over the prolonged time, but fir plywood would be 1/8' planneling. Keep in mind I install 130,000 ft/2 of the stuff per project (on the floor, thats 4500 sheets) and OSB was my choice in my own house and I recommend it to everyone else. As far as sizing most floors now are 19.2 joist spacing and require 3/4. If you are installing directly on to the joists at 16" OC then 5/8" would work, 3/4" just makes it that much more rigid of a floor. Either will work, installation is most important, lots of subfloor glue evenly applied to each joist and secure it right away to pull the sheathing into the joists. Now we can get into are screws better than nails argument.

Get your self a coil nailer and pound in 2.5" ardox nails it will never move.
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