Building new ceiling

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Hi all,

I'm just after some advice, the ceiling in my latest room renovation project is bowed at one end, I've not fully investigated yet but speaking to the previous occupant (wife's father) he says the boards follow one of the joists (warped). I want to get a perfect flat ceiling, I've spoken to some people about this and the concencus is to build a wooden frame slightly below the level of the current ceiling and board. I've looked at the metal alternatives such as Knauf C system and I cost it at around £300 for the frame alone, the wooden equivalent comes in a less that £100 (its just slightly more time consuming). The thing I'm not sure on is the size of wood I need to support something 3.6m x 3.9m and hold 9.5mm board. What size do I need on the board joins? If anybody has any tips for this sort of job I'd be most apprectiative.
Thanks in advance.
 
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Hi there, how deep is the warped joist? If its not that bad you may even be able to take of the exisiting plaster board and trim the warped section off then add your plaster board ( you dont want to weaken the joist by trimming off too much )...or alternativley take off the plaster board and pack the other joists out with slithers of wood to make level. These would be a cheaper options. 2by2 inch is more than adequate to create a false ceiling over a small area. Hope this helps.

others may comment further on this.
 
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I've added some pictures, at the weekend I had a joiner round to look at putting some door casings in. He suggested I pull the ceiling down to look what was causing the warp. I taped myself in the room and pulled a small section down and was not pleased. The joists holding the ceiling up had warped and were not solid, they flexed if you pushed the middle up. When looking at the joists, they only seem to be fixed into the wall at either end, they are not connected to the roof. There is no way I can shave enough off and I don't think they would support 12.5 mm plaster boards in their current state. I have ordered some 2 x 4 to replace, whats the best way to attach this to the wall? and how should I deal with the old joists, they hang a couple inches below the rest of the ceiling. I think I can level the rest of the ceiling using bits of wood. Any advice is appreciated. Thanks
 
Personally I'd be more concerned about making a proper job of supporting those joists by providing both virtical support & lateral cross bracing. Replace any that are permanently warped, re-board & skim; problem permanently solved & probably for less than fitting a false celing.
 
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I've just finished curing the exact same problem in a 4.5m x 3m room. Original 3" x 1 ½" ceiling joists (bungalow) were bowed, as was the 4" x 2" binder, and it sloped. Once the ceiling had come down, I pushed everything back up flat with acros. The binder was strengthened with a 150mm x 47mm timber, and the joists levelled by doubling up with new 3" x 1 ½" timbers. Also replaced a couple of the really bowed joists with 100mm x 47mm timbers. However, in hind sight if I was doing it again I'd just replace each joist one at a time with new 100mm x 47mm and the same with the binder.
 
Whats the best way to fit these to the wall? It is a flat brick wall with 2 x 1 1/2 holes for exisiting joists. Should I use joist hangers? Have a quick look in a shop and could only find hangers to join to wood.
 
Whats the best way to fit these to the wall? It is a flat brick wall with 2 x 1 1/2 holes for exisiting joists. Should I use joist hangers? Have a quick look in a shop and could only find hangers to join to wood.

Just looked at your pics, difficult to tell the layout of the building, but as already mentioned you don't appear to have any lateral restraint of the walls / roof rafters. I would expect the ceiling joists to do this by running 90deg to the direction they are currently in and fixed to the rafter ends and wall plate. Anyway, if you plan to just replace the existing joists you could chop / cut out the brickwork to allow you to insert the larger 4"x2" joist. A quicker easier way is to fix a vertical wall plate, e.g. 150mm x 47mm C16 timber, to the walls with resin anchors, then joist hanger the new 4" x 2" joists off this. You should also consider installing a binder timber mid span and 90deg to these joists.
 
Sorry, I'm a self builder with IT as my day job. Are we talking about fixing a length of wood to each wall (not sure what a resin anchor is?), hanging the 3 new joists with hangers and then fixing a piece of wood the same way as the end pieces across the middle of the 3 joists and fixing this somewhere to help stop it sagging again. Sorry to sound stupid. Thanks for the advice.

p.s. Somebody else commented that joists usually run the other way to stop the roof sliding apart. The is 2 sets of hefty pearlings, one set before the attic bedroom starts and then another 3/4 towards the apex. Plus the house has been standing for 100 years. I am starting to get the feeling its not very well constucted.
 
Sorry, I'm a self builder with IT as my day job. Are we talking about fixing a length of wood to each wall (not sure what a resin anchor is?), hanging the 3 new joists with hangers and then fixing a piece of wood the same way as the end pieces across the middle of the 3 joists and fixing this somewhere to help stop it sagging again. Sorry to sound stupid. Thanks for the advice.

p.s. Somebody else commented that joists usually run the other way to stop the roof sliding apart. The is 2 sets of hefty pearlings, one set before the attic bedroom starts and then another 3/4 towards the apex. Plus the house has been standing for 100 years. I am starting to get the feeling its not very well constucted.

Forget it; those joists aren’t doing anything other than holding up the ceiling boards. Renew the joists with timber that isn’t warped; that span looks like it could do with two sets of lateral bracing (cross noggins) between each joist. At a suitable point (preferable in between the lateral bracing) drop some vertical timbers from the roof trusses down & fix to the joists to hold them up; one or two depending on the span which I can’t really asses from the pics. It’s probably not your pics but I can’t enlarge them on the PC I’m using at the moment!
 

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