That weird stair landing in the old house on Maple Street took me a full day

It was a 1905 place with a landing that went from 4 feet wide to 2 feet in a weird curve. I figured maybe 2 hours to cut and fit the pad and carpet. Ended up being 8 hours because the floor was so uneven I had to build up the low spots with plywood strips and then hand-cut every piece. Anyone else run into a crazy floor like that and have a better way to handle it?

3 comments

3 Comments

davidcooper3mo ago

Sounds like a normal old house to me lol

miles7981mo agoMost Upvoted

Funny you mention the self-leveling cement thing. I actually read an article from an old contractor a few months back who said that stuff is almost never the answer in houses built before 1950. He called it a "one way trip to regret" because old wood moves, and cement doesn't. The whole article was about how these old houses were built with green lumber that dried and warped over decades, so level is never going to happen without basically rebuilding the floor. Seems like your buddy learned that lesson the hard way. Sistering joists may be slow work, but at least it respects how the house was built in the first place.

emma_butler873mo ago

My buddy redid his attic floor last year and it was a total mess. The boards were all different heights, like a wooden roller coaster. He tried using that self-leveling cement stuff first, which was a bad idea. It just ran into the cracks between the floorboards and made a bigger problem. He ended up doing what you did, sistering new joists and shimming for days. Old houses fight back every step of the way.