The Secret Beneath all Old Stockwell Floors
Ask a seasoned floor fitter what is keeping him/ her awake at night and it will not be the flooring. That will be what is below it. The ancient houses in Camberwell are all surprises–and hardly any of them pleasant ones as soon as you begin to strip away some of the carpet or break up the tiles. The one most prevalent issue that causes flooring jobs in this city to be over-budgeted, over-scheduled or just over is uneven subfloors. Experts of wood floor fitters London that worked in Victorian terraces, Edwardian conversions, and post-war council blocks around South London will explain you: the work actually occurs below the floor.
Best Flooring Fitters London has been working with uneven, damaged and even treacherous subfloors in South London more than 20 years. Camberwell, Herne Hill, Peckham, Brixton – each neighbourhood brings forth its variant of the identical problem. This is what really happens under the floor of a London flooring job, and why it is well sorted out that makes the difference between a floor lasting twenty years and one that begins to give way after less than a year.
The reason why Old Stockwell Properties are so difficult
The Victorian terrace or the Georgian conversion at Stockwell was not constructed to contemporary standards. The floors were hand-laid, and on joists that have been 130-odd years absorbing moisture, drying out, settling, and sometimes coping with whatever disaster the century of intervening time has thrown on them. The outcome is gentle sloping of the floors, which have a depression in the centre, which rise towards the walls or a combination of both in varying sections of the same room.
It becomes more interesting in properties that have been reincarnated several times. A terraced house in Stockwell could have been a single house, divided into flats, re-divided, and refurbished. The floor structure is marked by each intervention. Patches of screed are old, and they are next to original timber. Layers of adhesive of the former floor coverings make ridges. At some time or other someone has sewed up a hole using the first thing that came to hand. You come across some extraordinary things.
Concrete subfloors, which are typical of ground-floor extensions and purpose-built flats throughout Stockwell, have a set of problems of their own. They crack. They settle unevenly. They hold moisture even after building work has been completed. And since concrete appears flat to the naked eye, homeowners may think that there is nothing to consider. Then the floor sinks and the click-lock joints begin to pop after three weeks since the surface was 6mm out of two metres.
Six millimetres doesn’t sound like much. Practically, it is sufficient to make a floating floor sway beneath your feet, apply pressure on adhesive joints, and make that hollow knocking noise when you walk over a part of the floor that is not well supported. The industry standard of most floor coverings is a tolerance of 3mm over two metres. It takes real preparation to get there out of the state of most Stockwell subfloors are in.
Self-Levelling Compound: How and When It Works and Does Not
Self-levelling compound – also known as floor leveller or screed – this is the tool of choice when it comes to levelling concrete and solid subfloors prior to installation. Pour it and then even it with a gauge rake and physics does much of the job as the liquid material seeks its own level. It becomes dry and offers a smooth and flat surface upon which it can be covered with almost any floor covering.
It seems to be a straightforward process. The instructions on the bag do not imply the execution should be done with more care. It is not negotiable to pour the subfloor without priming it, because without a primer the compound draws the moisture off of the concrete too quickly, compromises the bond, and may crack or crumble in a few months. It is important to get the gauging right. Excessively thin and the compound becomes uneven. Too thin and it may crack when strained.
Sometimes the answer to self-levelling compound is also not the right answer. On timber subfloors where there is still movement within them, liquid compound will crack as the boards stretch. Over subfloors where damp has been applied without a proper membrane under it will ultimately fail as the moisture moves through it. Using compound on top of old adhesive residue that has not been thoroughly prepared provides a bond no stronger than the adhesive – which is usually not very strong.
An experienced fitter evaluates the subfloor and picks up the compound bag. It is not merely, is this uneven?–but why is it uneven, what is it composed of, what is going on under it, and what is the proper sequence of preparation in this particular case? The rationalization of that is founded on experience. You can not cut corners.
Fearing what’s creeping beneath your present floor? Don’t guess. Obtain a good subfloor assessment by a team that has seen it all. Call Best Flooring Fitters London on 020 3322 7001 – we survey the subfloor as a part of all consultations, at no charge, and then we advise anything.
Battening Over Timber Subfloors: The Old Method Which is Still Effective
Timber subfloors that are not even but are structurally stable, as in the higher floors of Victorian terraces the length and breadth of Stockwell are often best prepared by battening. Timber battens are pressure-treated and attached to the subfloor at consistent centres, shimmed at the low points to form a level plane and the new floor is then laid over the battens.
It is especially effective with solid wood and engineered boards which will be secret-nailed or stapled instead of glued. The battens give a good point of fixing, raise the floor a notch higher than the underlying subfloor (which can be useful in older suspended floor systems to provide ventilation) and enable the installer to remove unevenness that would otherwise demand large quantities of levelling compound.
The trade-off is floor height. Battening elevates the finished floor by 40-60mm as per the size of the batten and any other underlayment. This can be a serious limitation in rooms with low ceilings or where the clearance at the door is already marginal, as is often the case with Victorian properties. Installation of new door thresholds, trimming door bottoms, and realigning skirting boards will increase time and expenses.
Moisture: The Issue that Slips under the Carpet
Uneven is visible. Moisture is not – and more flooring failures in Stockwell old houses have been due to it than to any other one thing. Victorian terrace ground-floor rooms often lack any damp-proof course or one that was put in many years ago and has since become ineffective. The subfloor moisture evaporates through the subfloor material and collects in the subfloor where it remains unseen until a wood or a laminate floor is installed over the subfloor.
The next thing is predictable in hindsight and preventable in the fore. Swelling and cuping of solid wood. Engineered boards delaminate at the core. The joints begin to lift and swell in laminate. Click-lock systems are losing their sale. The floor which appeared ideal on day one becomes disastrous after three months.
The solution is simple: but must be done prior to the laying of any levelling compound or flooring of any kind: check the moisture content of the subfloor with a calibrated instrument, lay down a moisture-resistant membrane or DPM (damp-proof membrane) where values are above the acceptable range, and leave to dry and stabilise before continuing. This step will increase the schedule by a day or two, on a concrete subfloor in a Stockwell ground-floor flat. You can afford to skip it and gamble the whole job.
Looking to find lvt fitters near me to rent a room on the ground floor? LVT is in fact among the more forgiving floor coverings to residual moisture – but being more forgiving is not being immune. Even LVT requires a well-prepared subfloor, with a moisture reading within the specification, to be installed. Those searching for lvt floor fitters near me should know that any reputable installer will always carry out a moisture test before fitting — especially in older London ground-floor rooms where damp is a known risk. Any more fit to miss the moisture test on a London room on the ground floor will be shaving an edge that will later present itself as an issue.
The Real Cost of Preparing Subfloors Wrong
That is the amount that people do not like to hear: repairing a flooring failure due to improper subfloor preparation is almost always more expensive than it would have been to do the preparation correctly in the first place. The floor has to come up. The subfloor has to be remediated. New flooring must be obtained and re-fitted. A single job attracts two charges on labour.
We once estimated a floor in Stockwell, which had been laid by a prior contractor over a concrete subfloor, with no levelling, and no check on moisture. The laminate was four months down. The joints were now open 2-3mm all over the room, some boards had swollen quite some way at the edges, and two places were now beginning to raise at the bottom by the window. The initial price of fitting was about 600. Remediation that had to be carried out completely, including subfloor preparation, and refitting cost them £1,100. It is a sore experience in a job that could have been properly done the first time at a cost of £750.
Laminate Over Problem Subfloors: A Possible Alternative
Premium laminate can be a very viable option when it comes to South London properties which require work on the subfloor but the budget is limited. A good underlayment system on a quality laminate is able to withstand slight residual unevenness better than most rigid floor coverings- within limits of course. The underlay is like a cushion, it soaks the minor surface irregularities that would be visible with a directly applied floor.
In the case of Camberwell properties where the subfloor is good enough with some preparation and not a complete remediation project, this combination of good preparation to bring within tolerance and quality laminate and suitable underlay provides an excellent result at a sensible cost. It is on this basis that Best Flooring Fitters London has installed cheap laminate floors on dozens of jobs in South London. We are aware of what products will withstand what subfloor conditions and we spec.
People Also Ask
Should I level my floor prior to installing laminate in a house in Stockwell?
Yes, in the majority of older London properties there is some amount of subfloor preparation required prior to laying laminate. The normal tolerance of laminate installation is 3mm variance in a 2m range. A majority of the South London subfloors are over that unprepared. Self levelling concrete subfloors are usually applied; timber subfloors are battened or ply overlapped.
The positive is that professional subfloor preparation, done correctly, will cost the installation of a laminate relatively little extra and will significantly increase the life of the floor. Best Flooring Fitters London incorporates the assessment of the subfloor in all surveys and charges preparation clearly – no surprises on the fitting day.
Don’t allow a problematic subfloor hold up your flooring project. Worse has been fixed in our team. To book your free survey with Best Flooring Fitters London, call 020 3322 7001 now or go to https://flooringfitterslondon.org.uk/ to book your free survey. We will tell you, what your subfloor requires, and what it will cost to put in order.