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Squeaky Floorboards


Bartholomew

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Hi all, 

Just bought my first house and what is drives me mad is squeaking cracking floorboard. I’ve removed laminated floor from 2 rooms and noticed that floor is squeaking soooo much. Floorboards are fixed with nails rather than screws. Can you please recommend some diy to fix it. And also what’s the best screws to use. Should I predrill before fixing screws? Should I removed all the nails? Thanks for any help! 
 

 

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Be careful though there may be pipes and cables under where you plans to screw down.

 

best to lift the squeaky boards to find our what’s under the. Look and see where fixings can be placed.

more work-yes, definitely less grief if you hit a pipe!

Edited by TonyT
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I share your pain! My upstairs is boarded with 18mm chipboard affixed with angular ring nails originally. These Spax screws haven't cured it but helped tremendously:

 

https://www.screwfix.com/p/spax-wirox-tx-countersunk-wirox-flooring-screw-4-5-x-60mm-300-pack/88716

 

Where I've used them on my own new flooring, where I also fitted the joists, the resulting floor is soundless. 

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If screwing down, then screw immediately adjacent to the nails. This should ensure you miss any pipes and cables as chippies usually give them a decent gap. If there's still a little movement and the nails squeak, a good squirt of WD40 can help cure and/or centre punch the nail down a tad. If it's chipboard and it's bouncing, it can be better to predrill same as screw size so the screw pulls the chipboard down rather than bitting into it. Like previously mentioned, it should really be glued too. My old house used to drive me nuts upstairs but of course the worst squeaks were where the central heating pipes were underneath it and way too dangerous to consider banging in an extra screw or two. New house is single storey, power floated concrete.... Silence at last! 

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Just now, Ultima357 said:

If screwing down, then screw immediately adjacent to the nails. This should ensure you miss any pipes and cables as chippies usually give them a decent gap. If there's still a little movement and the nails squeak, a good squirt of WD40 can help cure and/or centre punch the nail down a tad. If it's chipboard and it's bouncing, it can be better to predrill same as screw size so the screw pulls the chipboard down rather than bitting into it. Like previously mentioned, it should really be glued too. My old house used to drive me nuts upstairs but of course the worst squeaks were where the central heating pipes were underneath it and way too dangerous to consider banging in an extra screw or two. New house is single storey, power floated concrete.... Silence at last! 

 

That's the clever bit with the Spax screw design. It goes through the floor board creating a clearance for the thinner, plain shank. The threaded section under the head then bites in and pulls down the board. 

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4 minutes ago, Onoff said:

 

That's the clever bit with the Spax screw design. It goes through the floor board creating a clearance for the thinner, plain shank. The threaded section under the head then bites in and pulls down the board. 

Ah, yes forgotten about those, but they are quite pricey? Guess it depends on how many you plan on using. 

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7 hours ago, Ultima357 said:

Ah, yes forgotten about those, but they are quite pricey? Guess it depends on how many you plan on using. 

 

Reassuringly expensive! ? One of those products that just does what it says on the tin. A mate bought a lot of Spax decking screws direct from Germany albeit pre Brexit. Said they were miles cheaper than in the UK even factoring in shipping:

 

https://www.klokow-gmbh.de/en/

 

(Pity his deck warped to Hell where he didn't leave any expansion gaps... )

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14 hours ago, Ultima357 said:

If screwing down, then screw immediately adjacent to the nails. This should ensure you miss any pipes and cables as chippies usually give them a decent gap. If there's still a little movement and the nails squeak, a good squirt of WD40 can help cure and/or centre punch the nail down a tad. If it's chipboard and it's bouncing, it can be better to predrill same as screw size so the screw pulls the chipboard down rather than bitting into it. Like previously mentioned, it should really be glued too. My old house used to drive me nuts upstairs but of course the worst squeaks were where the central heating pipes were underneath it and way too dangerous to consider banging in an extra screw or two. New house is single storey, power floated concrete.... Silence at last! 

Hi. I’ve bought this screws which you recommend for me. And they actually doing great job. Apart from that one it’s seems like just go half into the floor. There’re is no pipes there so what possibly can go wrong .. asking for friend ? 

A452E355-7EE9-4E2B-AD5A-6FB88FC6CEA9.jpeg

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Also guys... so please see picture below. So between kitchen and dining room was wall... was because I knocked it down. Of course architect was involved but he just said I can put this down with no worries. I’m bit sceptical about it now. Is this wall could support anything? 

6CD67AEF-BA61-44D1-B675-09AEB0243664.jpeg

9555E029-9F9C-4A36-AA5A-821F6545E8DD.jpeg

D7661CD9-7B32-43EC-9EDE-048CCE023696.jpeg

7F746057-6022-40C0-87EC-C9B5DD0152E1.jpeg

Edited by Bartholomew
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My take with this would be pull out each nail one by one using my ancient slide hammer nail puller, and put screws down the nail hole.  Almost guaranteed not hitting pipes or cables as you are using the same nail hole.

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