I would like my floor levelled. No. You don't.

[Toby Newell]

Hello N***** Woodworks how can I help you?

Oh Hi, I would like my floor levelled.

- No. You don't.

Sorry, no I really do, I have to walk uphill to reach my desk and half way through a Zoom call I exit stage left on my chair.

- So you want me to annotate every board, remove them and hundreds of rusted fixings, make any repairs, cut new joists and relay? You know that takes two to three weeks right?

It's driving me nuts, I think my children are growing up sideways, the kids at school hace nicknamed him Scalene.

-Ok, so what is the maximum deflection?

The height difference?

-Yes

Er, I think its about one and a half, maybe two inches.

- So around 40mm then?

Yes, around that, see it's very unlevel.

- No. It's not.

THIS is unlevel.

 

[malcolm]

The window in your photo is impressive.

I have a bedroom floor that slopes from one side to the other plus a big dip where an undersized lintel was installed. Probably 6 inches over 5m. None of that shows up on the camera. It's not too annoying once the bed legs and furniture have been propped up with bits of wood. Repairs not quite to your standards 9 inch floorboards and a timber frame structure maybe from 1600ish but they've been up a few times so might be later.



I do plan to level my ground floor which only slopes maybe 3 inches. Having resolved never to do parquet ever again after repairing the pitch pine parquet in the snug I've orderd another 52m2 of the stuff to restore the living room back to original. May as well sort levels before it goes down.

I guess the problem is lifting an original floor is going to damage it. Apart from that it's surely just how much people want to fix the slope.

 

[LadyArowana]

Not just old properties, I ( not actually me, but my brilliant handyman ) was putting up some floor to ceiling bookshelves in our new build man-cave and the floor is out by enough to create a very visible lean. No such issues in the old house where thoughtful previous owner had a nice true and level concrete floor put in on the basement level*

*sarcasm of course. It should be lovely flagstones, but I couldn’t face the work of ripping it all out to see if the originals were there ( I suspect not based on other observations ) and putting in replacements if they weren’t.

 

[Toby Newell]

I think its cheaper to get a carpenter to scribe in stuff.

The only time it makes sense is if the floor is already loose as it has to be fixed anyway you are only paying for 50% of the job.

This floor is over 300mm out, not much I can do.

Apart from build a small staircase to the entrance and supply free hard hats to future occupants as I reduce the door height from 5 to 4ft...

 

[Toby Newell]

I think its cheaper to get a carpenter to scribe in stuff.

The only time it makes sense is if the floor is already loose as it has to be fixed anyway you are only paying for 50% of the job.

This floor is over 300mm out, not much I can do.

Apart from build a small staircase to the entrance and supply free hard hats to future occupants as I reduce the door height from 5 to 4ft...

The window in your photo is impressive.

I have a bedroom floor that slopes from one side to the other plus a big dip where an undersized lintel was installed. Probably 6 inches over 5m. None of that shows up on the camera. It's not too annoying once the bed legs and furniture have been propped up with bits of wood. Repairs not quite to your standards 9 inch floorboards and a timber frame structure maybe from 1600ish but they've been up a few times so might be later.

View attachment 9053

I do plan to level my ground floor which only slopes maybe 3 inches. Having resolved never to do parquet ever again after repairing the pitch pine parquet in the snug I've orderd another 52m2 of the stuff to restore the living room back to original. May as well sort levels before it goes down.

I guess the problem is lifting an original floor is going to damage it. Apart from that it's surely just how much people want to fix the slope.

I missed the sarcasm. Talk to HE and HE about that, they did the listing.

To compensate here is a door half way up the wall.

Hope this helps.

 

[Lacan07]

The window in your photo is impressive.

I have a bedroom floor that slopes from one side to the other plus a big dip where an undersized lintel was installed. Probably 6 inches over 5m. None of that shows up on the camera. It's not too annoying once the bed legs and furniture have been propped up with bits of wood. Repairs not quite to your standards 9 inch floorboards and a timber frame structure maybe from 1600ish but they've been up a few times so might be later.

View attachment 9053

I do plan to level my ground floor which only slopes maybe 3 inches. Having resolved never to do parquet ever again after repairing the pitch pine parquet in the snug I've orderd another 52m2 of the stuff to restore the living room back to original. May as well sort levels before it goes down.

I guess the problem is lifting an original floor is going to damage it. Apart from that it's surely just how much people want to fix the slope.

You can see the slope in relation to the skirting board behind the chair!

When I had two new joists inserted in my bathroom after chimney removal they forced the floorboards to ramp slightly at one end of the room, kind of similar to the above. I ended up planning the new joists, a lot of work though!

 

[Lacan07]

I think its cheaper to get a carpenter to scribe in stuff.

The only time it makes sense is if the floor is already loose as it has to be fixed anyway you are only paying for 50% of the job.

This floor is over 300mm out, not much I can do.

Apart from build a small staircase to the entrance and supply free hard hats to future occupants as I reduce the door height from 5 to 4ft...

I missed the sarcasm. Talk to HE and HE about that, they did the listing.

To compensate here is a door half way up the wall.

Hope this helps.

View attachment 9056

Surely the client asked you to build a staircase to the secret door?

 

[TudorCottage]

Our spare bedroom drops 4.5 inches over 12 feet 5 inches.

We have a small double bed in there that slopes down from the foot end to the head end. I would imagine this would result in a rush of blood to the head after a nights sleep. I sourced some adjustable feet, which are hidden and the bed now sits level. With the bed in place you really can‘t tell the room slopes at all.

 

[Cubist]

A few years back I decided to level the master bedroom floor here to get rid of an 8"(200mm) height variation and the various wooden blocks supporting the furnishings. Sadly, I could not do the job the right way, which was to jack up the summer beam responsible for the deepest depression, as some clown had used the void directly above the beam end that needed to be lifted to accomodate all the water services pipes.

That was unfortunate; but I got the job done anyway using a traditional 'firrings' approach. Luckily the various doors, stairs and windows did not pose any significant challenges.

 

[Feltwell]

Good to see you back Toby! I still haven't sorted the floors out here, keeps going to the back of the queue

Worst floor here for slope is our utility room, which is a modern extension! The floor structure isn't adequate I'm sure, it is a suspended floor and it was done by a previous owner who liked to employ cowboys, at some point I need to rip it up and sort it out. Another job......in the meantime we put up with a rather slopey and bouncy floor.

 

[Toby Newell]

Raise the bresummer beam, lol. Yes firrings and blocks are often the only solution in older cottages because the green beams often are twisted and irregular and have an inch or two of friable worm sapwood.

Also it's tricky augering a 16mm hole through 500 year old oak heartgrain for coach bolts

You basically take the path of least resistance, whilst ensuring not to cut any corners.