General Chat

Please i have very noisey floor boards ~sounds like a hard of elephants when someone walks aross the bedroom.

Lxxx

sounds like the wood has dried out and pinged off the joists. You would need to re screw them down and maybe put shims in if the joists have dropped too

Sorry Lizz, no easy answers I‘m afraid, assuming of course you’ve checked there are no elephant tracks on the carpet!

Traditional floorboards tend to creak just in a few places, modern floors are sheets of chipboard or ply, because they are bigger sheets often noise problems tend to be worse.
Either way the only solution is to lift the floor covering, drill through the board (really need to lift the board first to check for cables & pipes) and screw the boards (using 1 ½” no 8 countersunk screws as a rule) down into the joists.
Traditional boards are nailed; modern floors are also often nailed for speed of laying, over time nails work loose, screws tend not to.

Worst case scenario with a modern build noisy floor (sort of 1970s onward) the joists are not up to the job and the whole floor flexes causing noise.
It’s one of the frequently asked questions on Building and DIY websites.

Sometimes a couple of squeaky boards rubbing against each other can be improved by sprinkling a little talcum powder in the gap.

Re-fixing the boards is fairly straightforward for DIY or a simple job for a builder it’s just the upheaval that’s a pain!

Best wishes,
Mayfield.

We had very noisy floors when we first moved to this late 1970s house. We have cured it by:

Lifting chipboard floors, room by room, as they were recarpeted. Put in extra noggins, filled the voids with insulation, avoiding wires, pipes etc, and replaced boards with new.

It has been a great improvement, but is a big task. (We have done four bedrooms and two bathrooms - before the suites were replaced. We have one bedroom and the landing to do, next time the carpets are replaced.)

It has been lots of work, some mild swearing and quite an expense, but well worth it.

Elisabeth xx

You should hear our floorboards in our bedroom !!!! I can't even tiptoe without a terrible racket .I am sat downstairs now and can hear them going as OH is up there.One day we will get them sorted.They seem to get worse each year.