Floor boards

[i_am_fubar]

I took the carpet up in my room and found that all the floor boards have a 10mm gap between them. There T&G, but the tongue and groove doesn't seem to be being used.

I get the feeling that saving that little bit of money in floor boards has made the floor weaker. Is it worth re-laying them without a gap?

Sam.

 

[r896neo]

Talk about skimping on materials. It will certainly weaken the floor but not by any real amount but it will affect the flex and stiffness. It just sounds liike a pretty weird situation! By all means lift them and relay to do a proper job but it depends on what your putting back down.

you could just overbaord with thin ply if your lazy.

 

[i_am_fubar]

You have no idea.... This house was put together by trained (or possibly untrained) monkeys.

I swear, I could have honeslty put the stud walls together better when I was 5. The bricks have no morter between them horizontally. Theres far too few wall ties. Bare wires outside of fixing boxes. So far I've had to re-plaster EVERY lintel in the house. It was made cheep and nasty. So now I'm fixing it.

And I'm putting a carpet down.

To avoid having to rip the stud walls down. is it ok to just cut the boards over a joist and leave maybe a half foot of the orignals at each edge of the room (proving they are the same height)?

 

[r896neo]

yea of course. Do whatever if your carpeting. Just be on the safe side and add a few extra noggins between joists and screw them back down to avoid squeaking!