Hi guys, Juts wondering if anyone has any experience fixing Timber floors that make a popping or thump noise when walked on. My PPOR (around 50-60 years old) is on concrete stumps and brick piers with timber floors that has been resanded(all existing nails were repunched) a year or so back and noticed a bit more noise coming out of the floors lately. Some parts squeak a bit but some parts make a popping sound even though i can't see the boards moving. Any ideas? Cheers
Get underneath and check that the subframe is ok and no new problems. Sometimes on clay the foundations move a bit as water enters and leaves....but if it is something new then it needs a check. As @Propertunity said check the packing at the piers and see if there is anything obviously loose. Getting someone to walk on the floor while you are under the floor is an easy way to identify problems. Another quick way to quieten boards is liberal injection of construction adhesive around the bearers & joints in noisy areas of the floor......but best to do it properly if it's your PPOR...... Good luck
Thanks guys, The clay surface under the floors are always dry all year long. I suspect that when the sanding guy did his thing, he was using a very old/heavy belt sander and he had to go really deep using 40 grit sandpaper due to how botched the previous sanding was so maybe that might have done something to the piers. I'll crawl underneath and see if anything looks suspicious!
Sanding, no matter how deep, will not do anything to the piers. I suspect movement in the clay soils underneath - this is typical of clay.
This works a treat for a squeaky floor. I've jumped up and down many a time whilst hubby is under the house packing paper into a tiny gap between joist and floorboard. Baby powder into the gap between boards can help with the sound too.
That's a good idea running a bead of construction adhesive along the floorboard/joist junction. To see if the piers have settled or heaved you could make your own water level with a hose and check each pier in the subfloor. It's surprisingly easy to adjust a stump if you borrow a 'bottle jack' from Kennards Hire.. just use hardwood timber for a larger gap or fibre cement for a thinner gap.
If this isnt a structural problem, then a good acoustic underlay could help. I redid my floors from a DC Tech with this rubber underlay and it dramatically lowered the noise
Cheers Nathan, The thumping noise is pretty much gone from the lounge area now that the weather is warming up but it's still there in one of the bed rooms but to a very lesser extent. It only happens when i step on a few floor boards when before it was happening around most of the room.
