Protecting my hardwood floor from the feet of my MASSIVE incoming wine fridge

I have a Wine Enthusiast classic XL 300 bottle wine cellar incoming in the next couple of weeks. I will be setting it on top of original 100 year old hardwood flooring. I have professional remodelers going under the house to look at the joists and ensuring that the floor can hold the 1100 pounds of weight that the unit will bear when full, so the underside of the floor will be fine.

I am concerned about the four 2.5cm leveling feet that will contact the ground under the unit. It will be going in my dining room and as you might expect will be a showpiece as well. I want to protect my flooring from getting dented or otherwise damaged as the wine fridge sits there over time without resorting to something that would look unsightly or tacky.

The generic plastic cups that furniture sits on I would be afraid may not bear that much weight and might look bad, but not sure? Any other thoughts on this? I am open to suggestions…

My guess is that much weight on those small feet might dent an older/softer wood floor (not sure what your floor is obviously)? What about some type of a strong metal plate, maybe 1/2" thick and 3" square that you could paint to resemble the floor color and that could sit under each foot to disperse the weight out a bit?

Another idea might be a piece of wood as a platform. Agree with Marshall that probably want some mechanism to spread out the load.

And, don’t drop any bottles unless you put a throw rug.

-Al

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I have a 150 bottle wooden wine cabinet on casters that when even half full ended up leaving tracks in my wood floors when I rolled it across the room. Agree with spreading the load…what about large tiles that either compliment or match the floor?

Anecdotally, I have 100-year old oak flooring and those plastic furniture sliders do a good job of supporting a baby grand piano (~600 lbs.) Obviously YMMV for a fully-loaded wine fridge but you don’t need to spread the weight out too much in order to prevent denting.

We have these under our Le Cache and they work well. Allows you to slide the unit without gouging the floor. Also you can cut them to size.

What about something like this? Would seem to distribute the weight over a 3.5" diameter circle and the steel is 10 gauge, or a little over 1/8" thick. Since it is steel I would think it would distribute the weight reasonably, but would I need thicker than 10 gauge? I could go larger diameter as well if needed. Could cover bottom of the plate with felt and I would think that it wouldn’t damage the floor. Thoughts?

Chris, as for the plastic sliders, my big concern is that they might crack under the weight of the fridge and just break and give way. 600 lbs for a baby grand means about 200 pounds per slider; the wine fridge I would like to be able to have 300 pounds per platform - in case it weighs closer to 1200 pounds when loaded full of bottles (I estimate about 250 bottles? obviously won’t fit 300 as advertised - they never do).

How big/heavy is that Le Cache?

Just had a genius moment (maybe?)… any gun owners/target shooters in here who could vouch for the ability of something like one of these steel targets to continually hold and distribute the weight of the fridge? Would cover with felt on the bottom… Even if these are 4 inches in length I can offset them to not stick out from under the footprint of the fridge.

We use those heavy duty cups with the carpeted underside with an overloaded Eurocave.
Also under a piano

The rubber interlocking tiles they sell for under weight benches etc will do the trick

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The pros moving heavy stuff use masonite hardboard to protect floors from dollies and such. You could just leave some under the fridge and it will distribute the load. It’s available at any home improvement store or lumberyard. Heck, if you use movers, they could just leave the last board under there if you ask and if it looks the right size.

That all said, I have a built in Kitchen Aid fridge that weighed 500 pounds empty or so and it hasn’t sank into our oak floor.

I had one of these filled, on real wood floors and never noticed a dent.

I have a Baby Grand in my living room with original hardwood floor. I have these under the feet and it has protected the floor completely. They make them for upright in sets of 4 as well.
Grand Piano Caster Cups,Eison Solid Sapeliwood Piano Caster with Non-Slip & Anti-Noise Foam Floor Protectors for Hardwood Floor, Set of 3 Amazon.com

Plywood square/rectangle with boatloads of super sliders under.

FWIW I had a loaded 500 bottle fridge on 60 year old hardwood for 10 years without issue to hardwood or floor load. My fridge has 6 feet and I used small circular furniture sliders so I could slide it out (w. significant effort) to vacuum and clean the coils at the back. Have moved it to our basement and now have it on the super sliders mentioned above as it is now on a low pile berber and I still need to slide it out a few times per year to vacuum. I had calculated the total load was 1400-1525 lbs.

Don’t forget to make sure your unit is really level, not just when initially set up, but as it is loaded. Inexplicably mine is slightly off now, and it looks like its been loaded pretty equally. I’ve got hardwood floors too…but the Eurocave is the least of their problems between kids with roller skates and a King Shepherd.

I assume you have oak if you have a hardwood floor that’s 100 years old. It’s a pretty strong wood.

But a few questions. You’re not going to be moving your fridge regularly, right? So why go for something that will allow you to move it, and even if it does mark the wood after standing for years, what’s the problem?

You can put a piece of wood under the legs. Masonite is steamed wood chips placed under pressure, and it’s great for a lot of things, but it doesn’t have a lot of ability to distribute weight because of its structure. Small pieces of wood will work better. I just used pieces of oak flooring. Not to prevent marking the wood but to level the floor which had a drop of an entire inch over 2 feet. When I moved, there were no marks on the floor at all. The unit was a 250 bottle Eurocave.

Just to toss in a twister…

If the floor is sprung, I’d try to use anti-vibration pads. I think there can be some noise transmission from these to a sprung floor.

This will handle up to 800 pounds, I am sure you can find higher load rated versions with some looking…

This next one can handle 960 pounds per pad…

I would either use hockey pucks or finish a piece of hard wood to match as best I could if hockey pucks were unsightly.