Fitting skirting to uneven floors

[inwood]

What is the consensus on fitting skirting to uneven and sloping floors?

Two possibilites:
1. Slope skirting with floors, keeping same depth all the way around.
2. Cut base of skirting to ensure top of skirting is at the same level all the way around the room

and does anyone know of a good nationwide timber merchant who can supply deep skirting, 7"+?

 

[chuckey]

One room I have done, the joists sag > 1/2" in the middle, so the skirting boards on two opposite walls had a extra bit added with a suitable curvature planed on them. Lot easier then planing all 4 boards!
The last bedroom to do has a 2" fall from end to end (4 metres), but is fairly straight, so I'll just fix the skirting level to the floor.
I have made two short lengths of 11" skirting by using beech panel joiners to fix boards edge on edge. Fixings good, boards warped though -excessive damp in building!
I have lots of trouble with the wood warping across its width, lay damp rags down the centre of the concave surface for 3 days. Wood straightens (but for how long?). Else run a circular saw/ router down the back to machine a long slot in it to within .2" of the front. This allows the plank to be bent straight with its fixings.
Frank

 

[Flyfisher]

I guess it depends on the degree of slope. Our main bedroom has a fall of at least 9 inches from one side to the other (I must measure it sometime) so maintaining a level skirting is not really an option, it has to follow the floor. I think it also depends on whether you want to emphasis the rise/fall or not. A skirting board 8 inches one end and 6 inches the other might look a bit odd; it would certainly emphasise the fall of the floor - or it might make the skirting board itself look unlevel through optical illusion.

There's probably some 'magic proportion' (i.e. % of skirting height) that looks OK if not exceeded but odd if it is, e.g. taking an inch out of an eight-inch skirting would probably look OK but taking six inches would probably look a bit odd - but I'm not an interior designer so I'm just guessing!

 

[Lime]

I have an eye for level whether I like it or not (and often wish I hadn't) but I don't think there is any hard and fast rule of thumb for this problem.
Spirit levels only give one point of view and rooms may have many conflicting "natural" levels apart from the floor.
When faced with an uneven floor the skirting has to look right so other factors have to be factored in too.
the window frame may be at an angle or door frame or dado or picture rail or cornice.
Even a pipe running on the surface of the wall may affect your viewing judgement.

...and at the end of the day it is first impressions that count.
Lay the skirting board in positon and adjust the level with packing to what you think may be right.
Walk out of the room, wait a minute then walk back in.
What do you think?
When happy with a certain angled level ask a friend or the OH to look for you...don't say what you think of it beforehand.
If everyone is happy, who cares what other people think you should do.

Of course sometimes you may decide that no angled level looks right.
If everything in the room is all up and down in level then perhaps the skirting should match it.

 

[Taff in Glaws]

I run with the second option myself and scribed the skirting against my roller coaster boards. I mocked up first option and it didn't look right due to other prominent lines/levels throughout room so I went for a wonky look floor rather than wonky room.

 

[Ian Bond]

I had the same problems that Frank mentioned - a dip in the middle.

Fitting skirting in a wobbly old house is not an easy task. Good idea to forget the spirit level sometimes.

I decided not to trim any off the bottom of the skirting at the board ends, so at least I had a better chance of getting them to meet at the corners.

I scribed the boards as best as I could where they ran across the uneven boards though. Nailing into timber grounds gave a secure fixing and let me push the board into a close a fit as possible to both the curves of the wall and the floor. A short length of wood angled from the floor to the top of the skirting, with my weight applied helped here.

Not perfect, but the gaps aren't too big. I suppose I could always fit a cover moulding around the base of the boards to close the gaps some more.

Hopefully you won't be doing too much plastering in the room afterwards - need to be a bit careful if you're wetting the walls down. I had some cupping and joints opening slightly, which is annoying. And some minor cracking to the patched plaster over the skirting in places a few months later.