Looking for a little advice on how to stop the flooring in my bedroom creaking…. 😉

The flooring is some quite nice hardwood (possibly Oak) floor boards, about 8cm in width. I believe that these are laid on top of, and in the same orientation as the original Victorian timber floorboards, which from where I can expose them elsewhere in the house look to be about 18cm in width. I can’t see an easy way to confirm this in the room without trashing the oak boards or skirting. I don’t know the depth of the oak flooring, but it is generally level to the carpet in the hallway outside the door, so I would guess around 15mm – it feels pretty solid.

The oak flooring looks to be generally very well laid, with next to no gap (less than 0.5mm)between the boards. However in the area by the door with heavier for traffic, there is the tiniest bit of bounce/movement from the original boards beneath which is propagating upwards and resulting in very sight movement between the oak boards. Any glue or filler that was fitted between the oak boards in these areas has disappeared, resulting in a creak.

The room is otherwise well finished, and I’d rather not rip up all the flooring to reset it, or replace with carpet.

After months of being asked to do something, today I’ve played around by jamming a few 1mm plastic spacers between the offending creaks which seems to have gone some way to sorting it, but is more a demonstration that something can be done rather than a solution.

Any suggestions on how the creaking can be easily and neatly fixed with minimum of disruption and moving of furniture? Some kind of wooden wedges? A grout? Resin/glue injected in the cracks? Wood oil to lubricate the creaks?

We’ve been in the house nearly 2 years, and the creaking is the same throughout the seasons/ changes in temperature and humidity.

Thanks all.

Photo for reference

Try some talcum powder in the joints of the flooring. I did it on the stairs of my old house, worked a treat for a good few years.

Edit: if it’s the boards underneath there’s not a lot you can do other than lift the flooring.

I have encountered this very same situation, a friend asked me if I could think of anything to stop her oak floor creaking. Again this had been laid over original floorboards and fortunately they were solid and the creaking was due to the years of traffic wear on the original floor.
I suggested that trying to get some expanding foam into the void would hopefully fix the creak. I drilled 2 holes in the areas where you could see the oak moving when you walked across it, sprayed expanding foam into the holes. Once the foam had cured, I filled the holes with oak pellets and once finished with a little Osmo oil unless it’s pointed out, difficult to see where the holes were drilled.
Edit, forgot to say that I put a piece of perspex weighted down over the holes to encourage the foam to expand in the desired direction

Thanks for the tips.

I liberally applied talc to all of the joins in the oak boards yesterday. Using a rubber mallet to gently agitate boards to help the talk get in to the joints.

I still have a creaky floor.

I thank that the next step might be using some filler as per @Sandboy ‘s suggestion

If you need , or will need to do any work in the room beneath, can you access from there to wedge and glue beneath original floor and joists ?

Far from my area of expertise but I reckon I’d either be lifting and relaying those, or putting up with the creaking.

I think I posted a similar thread a couple of years back and found no solutions

Tried talc and no difference. Even tried re oiling

When redoing our house the architect noticed the creaking in our old floor and said it had been laid too tightly. We re did the floor as part of the renovations and no creaking, in the ground floor at least.

I think Couger’s advice might be the only real solution.

Creaking comes principally from movement in the finished floor or sub-floor. The noise is either the wood moving at a fixing point or moving against another piece of wood where they touch, but there’s a tiny bit of room for movement.

To fix the OP’s problem, he’ll either need to lift and re-lay the affected boards – probably not what he wants to do. So to get rid of any movement is going to require a screw of some sort. You need to isolate the points at which the creaks are happening. Best way to do this is to get a rough idea by walking and then getting on your hands and knees and pressing with your thumbs to get you right to the point.

You can either try and fix through your floor with a screw, or even better, get yourself a box of tongue-tite screws (Toolstation and Screwfix both stock) and fire one of these in at an angle so as not to go through the sub-floor and “stitch” the boards together. These will self-countersink leaving an approx 5mm hole you’ll need to fill.

It’s highly unlikely you’ll be able to solve your problem with talcum powder or filling with new glue. The amount of movement needed for a squeak is tiny.

If the squeaking is in your sub-floor, then sorry, not much you can do without access from underneath.

If the boards are tongue and grooved together, then often the tongues are glued.
Therefore, talking them up will be impossible without cutting.

I stopped our staircase from creaking by liberal use of expanding polyurethane glue.

Quiet as a mouse now.
I would try Sandboys approach with the caveat that you don’t want to stop it being able to freely expand and contract.

If you need , or will need to do any work in the room beneath, can you access from there to wedge and glue beneath original floor and joists ?

No. The ceiling below is in a good state, and we have no plans to touch it.

Far from my area of expertise but I reckon I’d either be lifting and relaying those, or putting up with the creaking.

It is beginning to feel like lifting and relaying might be the only proper solution to the creaking. That however will require removal of all furniture,skirting, some bespoke fitted furniture and a sink unit that has been built over the floor. Then redecorating. It feels like a lot of work for a creak.

Not sure if putting up with the creaking is an option though, it wakes us if either of us goes to the loo in the night, and soon we will have a newborn baby in the room with us.

Edit- @deadlydarcy and @kayak replied whilst I was typing. Thanks for the tips. Countersinking some screws to stitch together might be worth trying.

I think it likely that if I do try and remove the oak flooring then it will be ruined in the process

A tip I heard about ages ago is to rub candle wax along the edges of floorboards, which isn’t really an option here, however, it might be worth trying rubbing a candle across the joints, and then using a thin piece of plastic of some sort that’ll fit into the gap push wax down in between the boards. It’ll take a bit of work, but as the area seems fairly confined, easier to concentrate on. Do it a few times, backwards and forwards to shave bits of wax off then push into the gap, with a bit of luck it’ll lubricate the boards, and it won’t dry out over time.

If you’re at the do or die stage, counter sink some screws around the bit that moves then cover up with some oak plugs. With work you could probably get the finish either barely noticeable or “rustic and charming” as is your want

So someone laid new boards (strips) on top of old floorboards – that’s a ‘bodge’ IMO.

I’m presuming they did it because of wear/damage to the originals and it was easier just to lay another layer on top? But if I was going to do this bodge I think I’d have at least laid them at 90 degrees to the originals, and with a soft ‘layer’ in-between.

How to (properly) fix it? Take it all up and re-lay with new full-width floorboards. Anything else is just another bodge.

^^^
The op says it’s all great quality with no gaps and reports no issues apart from a tiny bit of creak in one area. But yeah, rip it all out and start again… 👍😂

But if I was going to do this bodge I think I’d have at least laid them at 90 degrees to the originals, and with a soft ‘layer’ in-between.

I agree that putting the boards at 90deg might have been better.

But

So someone laid new boards (strips) on top of old floorboards – that’s a ‘bodge’ IMO.

I’m not sure about this though. It is just a different floor finish. Using your logic then carpet is a ‘bodge’

@countzero

A tip I heard about ages ago is to rub candle wax along the edges of floorboards, which isn’t really an option here, however, it might be worth trying rubbing a candle across the joints, and then using a thin piece of plastic of some sort that’ll fit into the gap push wax down in between the boards

Good idea. I might actually try dripping some hot candlewax down the areas with movement before I resort to countersinking some additional screws in there

I guess that if you go down the wax route and it didn’t work, then any adhesive is unlikely to work afterwards either.

When looking for similar suggestions, this kit came up. Not tried it (yet) but the youtube vid i found looks good 🙂

Anyone got any tips for reducing the noise of my children stomping over the floorboards? They’re half my weight but manage to be four times as loud.

Our kitchen floor creaked. We drilled 2mm holes in the joints every few inches, then injected an expanding glue into it. Worked well and you can’t see the repair.
It’s getting ripped up this week so the kitchen fitter may well curse us 😂