Hi folks,
A couple of months ago when pulling up the horrid floor covering in our kitchen I noticed that the floor was somewhat "bouncy" around and under a unit. When the floor covering was pulled up and the unit removed, it appears that some bad plumbling has been leaking down the wall and creeping under the floor, turning an entire section of the floor into a mushy wet weetabix like substance - which crumbled to bits in my hands. Under the crumbling section of chipboard I found a polystyrene insulation block covered by a blue plastic membrane sheet. Under this is what appears to be a floor consisting of solid concrete blocks.
I'm left with a bit of a dilema, as the kitchen floor itself is a bit of a mess. It's largely uneven with different thicknesses of chipboard, bumps, humps and slopes, gaps and warped sections. Should I simply replace the knackered section and be left with a functional but largely unsatisfactory job, or should I rip the whole lot up and start from scratch? (gulp).
Some questions that might help me make up my mind.
1) While I appreciate nobody here is psychic lol, what am I likely to find? Will there likely be a framework, or is it possible that the chipboard could just "float" on the polystyrene blocks? There doesn't appear to be any framework around the edges where the knackered section has been pulled up.
2) If I remove the whole lot, will any insulation need to go down first, or could I simply level the concrete floor a little (with a self levelling compound) and put down something like a 18mm plywood? Would this need to be on a framework or could it be layed directly on top of the concrete?
3) if the floors coming up, I'm thinking it might be an idea to partition a section of kitchen off, as we'd like a walk in closet. I'm guessing it would be best to partition this before laying the plywood?
My apologies if this all sounds a bit mad. To give you some background, I'm competant at basic DIY and woodworking, but haven't a clue about the insulation/damproofing side of things. I'm confident I can get the woodworking side of things spot on, but don't want to do anything crazy that will result in a cold or damp kitchen.
Oh and the kitchen is 5m x 4m
Cheers
A couple of months ago when pulling up the horrid floor covering in our kitchen I noticed that the floor was somewhat "bouncy" around and under a unit. When the floor covering was pulled up and the unit removed, it appears that some bad plumbling has been leaking down the wall and creeping under the floor, turning an entire section of the floor into a mushy wet weetabix like substance - which crumbled to bits in my hands. Under the crumbling section of chipboard I found a polystyrene insulation block covered by a blue plastic membrane sheet. Under this is what appears to be a floor consisting of solid concrete blocks.
I'm left with a bit of a dilema, as the kitchen floor itself is a bit of a mess. It's largely uneven with different thicknesses of chipboard, bumps, humps and slopes, gaps and warped sections. Should I simply replace the knackered section and be left with a functional but largely unsatisfactory job, or should I rip the whole lot up and start from scratch? (gulp).
Some questions that might help me make up my mind.
1) While I appreciate nobody here is psychic lol, what am I likely to find? Will there likely be a framework, or is it possible that the chipboard could just "float" on the polystyrene blocks? There doesn't appear to be any framework around the edges where the knackered section has been pulled up.
2) If I remove the whole lot, will any insulation need to go down first, or could I simply level the concrete floor a little (with a self levelling compound) and put down something like a 18mm plywood? Would this need to be on a framework or could it be layed directly on top of the concrete?
3) if the floors coming up, I'm thinking it might be an idea to partition a section of kitchen off, as we'd like a walk in closet. I'm guessing it would be best to partition this before laying the plywood?
My apologies if this all sounds a bit mad. To give you some background, I'm competant at basic DIY and woodworking, but haven't a clue about the insulation/damproofing side of things. I'm confident I can get the woodworking side of things spot on, but don't want to do anything crazy that will result in a cold or damp kitchen.
Oh and the kitchen is 5m x 4m
Cheers
