leveling a floor

[joec]

i'm working in a 150 year old house (supposedly) and it use to be two rooms and now it is one whole room(with a steal beam supporting the structure)

my question is.. between the two rooms there is quite the difference in

elevation... and everything is very uneven. would it be a good idea to rip out everything to the joyces and resubfloor it?


am i crazy? or would the effort and the money be worth it? or just try something totally different.

[Cole]

Joe, the time you would spend on tweaking the floor, it might be easier to go in and rip everything out and start over.

But it also depends on the situation.

[CThomp]

Depending on the size of the room it may not even be a big deal to rip up the floor.

Also, you might not even have to rip up the subfloor.

What I would do: Pull up the hard wood flooring carefully so you don't muck it up. Inspect the existing subflooring to make sure it's still in good shape. Add subflooring on top of the existing to level it out. Replace the hardwood. Be done with it.

Tearing up the subflooring is only necessary if you need to reinforce the joists or that beam or something like that.

I had to rip up the sub floor in my kitchen to add a joist between all my existing joists to make sure my floor system could support tile without cracking.

My old floor was:

2x8's on 24's with 8ft spans. 3/4"x8 diagonal planking over that, and then flooring.

New floor:

2x8's on 12's with 8ft spans. 3/4" t&g subfloor ply. 1/4" backer board, thinset, and 16" tiles. Feels like I'm walking on a slab.

There is a chance I could have just ripped up the planks, put in lots and lots of blocking, and then the new subflooring but I didn't want to risk cracked tiles.

[joec]

it's very old.. i believe... 3/4"x8 diagonal planking... (its a old hospital) um, i really didnt look at the joyces... because everytime i looked at the floor i got a headache, heh... i told my boss what my opinion was(but of course i didnt share the information with the home owner) and he said.. yeah, but no.. so i just basically went with the uneven floor trying to make it as level as possible with shims and 3/4 plywood and 1/2 plywood... there is going to be hardwood flooring over that so, i'm hoping the flooring will give the illusion and the feel of being level.. but i guess i won't be to sure until its done and over with..

[PAJJ]

Have you looked into self-leveling compounds? Some guys come in, pour down a concrete slurry, let it self-level and harden, then finish the floor.