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The nearest I have to that is some Victorian T&G floorboards, which I am reticent to damage more than I have to.
At the last house I finally got fed up faffing around getting boards up - and I treated myself to a nail puller. It's like a slide hammer, with jaws on the end. Jaws open either side of a nail, hammer down till the jaws have sunk far enough into the wood, then lever over and the jaws grip the nail head and pull it out. Leaves a rectangular indentation, but the least damaging technique I've found. I pulled all the nails in one room and put screws in - no sqeaks :D
However, since the OP was talking about "...a few lights on the outside gable of the house", I had though that they could probably potential access from roof space - although maybe there isn't access to that, either!
There isn't on our extension. The original house is the style where the walls are lower than theupstairs ceilings which slope down with the roof line for the last foot or so. The extension (teed off the back) has the same roof profile, but instead of a regular ceilng, the lounge has a vaulted ceiling - so no attic at all. There's a spot right at the apex of the gable where I could drill through from the outside and fish a wire alongside the ridge beam - but otherwise I'd come through into the lounge.
 
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At the last house I finally got fed up faffing around getting boards up - and I treated myself to a nail puller. It's like a slide hammer, with jaws on the end. Jaws open either side of a nail, hammer down till the jaws have sunk far enough into the wood, then lever over and the jaws grip the nail head and pull it out. Leaves a rectangular indentation, but the least damaging technique I've found. I pulled all the nails in one room and put screws in - no sqeaks :D
It's not the nails which are the primary problem with T&G but, rather, the need to cut through the tongues without damaging the sides of the boards too much.

Kind Regards, John
 
It's not the nails which are the primary problem with T&G but, rather, the need to cut through the tongues without damaging the sides of the boards too much.

Kind Regards, John
A trick I learnt from the chippies when working in a grade 1 listed building. Removing the nails from 3 adjacent boards generally allows the removal of the centre board without cutting the tongues. It's tricky/fiddly and probably needs handles [blocks of wood etc] fixed by screwing into the nail holes.
 
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I have one, but it's still difficult to leave the edges of the boards intact.

Edit: ... and, as I've just written to SUNRAY, there are lots of 'hidden' nails through the tongues, which makes cutting through them 'fun' :)

Kind Regards, John
 
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A trick I learnt from the chippies when working in a grade 1 listed building. Removing the nails from 3 adjacent boards generally allows the removal of the centre board without cutting the tongues. It's tricky/fiddly and probably needs handles [blocks of wood etc] fixed by screwing into the nail holes.
I've tried that, with varying success. The Victorian boards I'm talking about are very narrow (just 3"-4"), so it usually has to be at least 5 boards, not just 3 - and they tend to be very long, and go under massive (around 10" x 2½") skirtings.

Worst of all, not only are the boards very tightly butted against each other, but most of the nails are through the tongues, and hence not even visible/accessible from above.

Kind Regards, John
 
ooo that's narrow for boards that age.

Nails through the tongue is a ruddy great game changer, the only advantage there being once the tongues are cut there is noting to stop it being lifted out. At least being that narrow they will bepresumably flexible enoughto allow them to bow to be slid from under the skirtings.
I've tried that, with varying success. The Victorian boards I'm talking about are very narrow (just 3"-4"), so it usually has to be at least 5 boards, not just 3 - and they tend to be very long, and go under massive (around 10" x 2½") skirtings.

Worst of all, not only are the boards very tightly butted against each other, but most of the nails are through the tongues, and hence not even visible/accessible from above.

Kind Regards, John
 
ooo that's narrow for boards that age.
We have 'the sublime and the ridiculous', in different parts of the house. The Victorian ones are as I have described - T&G, 4" or less wide (and tightly butted). The Georgian ones are square-edged (not T&G) and are mainly 10"+ wide (varying widths), but are "a labour of love" - the undersides are not planed, but each place that they pass over a joist (generally 3" x 9" or thereabouts) the underside has been chiselled/axed so as to sit perfectly on the joist!
Nails through the tongue is a ruddy great game changer, the only advantage there being once the tongues are cut there is noting to stop it being lifted out.
True ... eventually. However, cutting tongues which have nails through them is 'interesting'!
At least being that narrow they will be presumably flexible enough to allow them to bow to be slid from under the skirtings.
I'm not so sure about that. For a start, they are pretty thick but don't forget that the skirtings are very deep.

Fortunately, it's a long time since I last had to play that game, and I have no intention of doing so again any time soon, if ever!

Kind Regards, John
 
... and I have no intention of doing so again any time soon, if ever!
I'd like to say that's what I was thinking when I had to lift part of the main bedroom floor - done with those horrible big sheets of weatabix. Had to carefully trim edges off to get them up as they'd been done before the skirtings were put on. Of course, by the time I;ve got them to the point where I can disengage the T&G and lift a board out - when they go back there's a gap which is at least hidden once the carpet is down. At least the T&Gs weren't glued which I believe is required practice these days - a friend has recently done a loft conversion, he tells me the requirement is that the sheets are both glued at the edges, and onto the joists :evil:
One day, there'll be a lot of new T&G (engineered) planks going down in some rooms - and a lot of weatabix being thrown out.

But, I can understand why builders love these big sheets - it's a lot less work and they DGAS about future maintenance.

Amusing, if it weren't so bad, the house my mum was looking at had some fancy boards declared to be waterproof. The vendor was going on about these waterproof floor boards - while I observed that in the bathrooms, they were full of big holes for the pipes. So the one place where being waterproof could be an advantage, was also the one place where it wasn't :rolleyes: Mind you he was "selling" lots of features which I could see were just "the bare minimum building control would let them get away with".
 
That's could be a summary of my thoughts at the time :whistle:
Also not allowed, or perhaps only allowed with such restrictions as make it impractical, is embedding the ends of joists into the inner leaf for support. The standard now is to bolt a hanger plate (basically just another joist) to the wall and fix the joist ends to that using brackets and a lot of nails - meaning that along two walls, there's a lump of 2" thick timber, typically full depth of the under-floor cavity, bolted to the wall where you'd want to put cables. First fix, no problem - just drill holes and thread the cables through. Later maintenance/modifications - :mad:

Yes, modern building standards are for non-maintainable buildings. I wouldn't want to buy a new build, not unless I had the opportunity (and budget) to have it "customised" for maintainability - but if I had that budget, it would be easier to just have one built to my spec (I wonder how many trade people would walk off the job before it was done :unsure:)
 
At least the T&Gs weren't glued which I believe is required practice these days - a friend has recently done a loft conversion, he tells me the requirement is that the sheets are both glued at the edges, and onto the joists :evil:


But, I can understand why builders love these big sheets - it's a lot less work and they DGAS about future maintenance.
My daughter purched a new built some 10-12 years ago and they were specced as glued joints and onto joists and screwed. However when I discovered the kithen appliance switch panel and cooker point were fed by 2.5mm² t&e radials on 32A MCB's [contrary to the spec and test cert] 1st floor boards had to be lifted to run the new cables and the boards were not even fixed down.

Oh yes builders love the big sheets.

Most access these days seems to be from the ceiling rather than the floor, I can understand why.
 
Yes the standard is now chipboard sheets glued on the joints and glued and screwed to the joists with PU adhesive. This is to make the board edges / joints water resistant and to stop the squeaking of floorboards which plagued so many new build houses for a long time.
 
Yes the standard is now chipboard sheets glued on the joints and glued and screwed to the joists with PU adhesive. This is to make the board edges / joints water resistant and to stop the squeaking of floorboards which plagued so many new build houses for a long time.
Maybe so, but I think that my "Good Grief" comment still has to stand :)

Kind Regards, John
 
Are you surprised that house builders are now being forced to actually do something properly?
 

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