Experience with wooden floors?

DorothyDynamite · 12 Apr 2021

Hi, first post here.

We bought a home just two weeks before the pandemic kicked off... about 2 months later we noticed the living room floor can wobble. We viewed the house three times and visited for measurements many times after, we didn’t notice the floor shift once! There was nothing in the report about the floor, but there was a family of 8 living here so we expected a little wear and tear but surely it can’t be that?!

Our tiny toddler runs around and she can be 6-10 feet away from you and you can feel the floor really move; one of our cupboards shakes and the plant on top wobbles viciously. I don’t think it’s just a floorboard issue as it doesn’t feel like it’s just one small area, could it be the joists? We don’t have a basement, it’s a 70s semi detached.

We have the same issue upstairs too, above the same room!

who would be the right tradesperson to contact about it?

What a nightmare. I’m starting to miss the concrete floor in our old home!

conny · 12 Apr 2021

Possible that your joists just need a bit of packing under them.
A joiner would seem the obvious tradesman to get in. He could tell if they need packing or if the problem is to do with something else.
A good one will ensure the floor is level and check for things like wet/dry rot and woodworm etc

DorothyDynamite · 12 Apr 2021

Amazing, thank you! I honestly have never had to deal with his before so I didn’t even think of a joiner. That’s really helpful, I’m grateful for your reply!

diy_fun_uk · 12 Apr 2021

I was brought up in a house with a solid floor, however most houses I've lived in thereafter had suspended wooden floors as does my current house. They're prone to shaking as you describe, especially if anyone runs about, including kids

With the ground floor, depending on how bad it is, it's usually possible to brace the joists from underneath if there's space to do so, or to check the areas where they're already supported to see if some packing is required as per conny's reply. Sistering of the joists is another option. Upstairs is less straightforward as you can't introduce a permanent bracing from underneath, however sistering the joists is still an option.

If it makes you feel better, I recently got a new washing machine and the floor shake was pretty bad

luckily I've got a reasonable crawl space under the house so was able to introduce additional bracing which has helped.

Good luck with it.

conny · 12 Apr 2021

@DorothyDynamite, just to explain diy_fun_uks' post.
Sistering means fitting new joists adjacent to the current ones and bolting them together. When a joiner puts these in he may be able to put the ends of the new joists into what is called a 'joist hanger'. This may allow him to raise it slightly above the existing one to take the springiness out of the floorboards. He would then bolt/screw this to the old joist.
It's a fairly big job which would probably involve taking up all your existing floorboards and then re-laying them onto the sister joist.

DorothyDynamite · 12 Apr 2021

Thank you, thankfully I remembered that term from a show I watched

I’ve had a call back from a company who were super helpful over the phone, gave me some advice and told me to have a look under the floorboards if I could (will try to this weekend as I have a toddler!) they told me what to look for and to call if I had any questions or needed any further help, which was great! Will update when I managed to get time to do it

conny · 13 Apr 2021

Don't make the mistake of kneeling on the joist you are looking at, LOL. Best way would be to step on and off a few times to see if it moves near where it is supported or have someone kneeling next to it while you test it.

DorothyDynamite · 13 Apr 2021

First step will be to roll the carpet back honestly the whole left third of the room moves so we’re just gonna roll back all of that carpet to see what we are dealing with.
It’s nothing like when you’ve got a wobbly floorboard (when someone steps and you can see the end of the board lift up under the carpet) it’s the whole floor! The cupboard that shakes is quite heavy and has a solid bottom (not legs that could be uneven) so we’re certain it’s the floor!
Will update as soon as we are done!

conny · 13 Apr 2021

Without a basement you maybe lucky enough to have a decent crawl space, (18"-24"+), under there, which will probably make things easier to get at.

DorothyDynamite · 13 Apr 2021

My mom’s house was similar and had a few foot of space below (someone stood in it up to their waist!) so fingers crossed we have the same luck

diy_fun_uk · 13 Apr 2021

I've been under mine today, from ground to underside of joists varies between 70-80cm so not too bad. My shoring up to stop washing machine vibrations had loosened, I think the wood I used has dried out and shrunk!

DorothyDynamite · 13 Apr 2021

Oh no, that’s not good! Thankfully our washing machine is in the converted garage so we have some concrete there not looking forward to moving furniture and rolling up our carpets this weekend to check ours

Experience with wooden floors?

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