Floating Walls

[Tim]

Help!

Just moved into a new property and I have had to replace the upstairs floorboards due to woodworm. Unfortunately, due to parental help, the

28mm floorboards have been replaced with 19mm PTG.

The problem is this - in removing the floorboards, we noticed the walls are hanging in midair. Its an old house (about 200 years we reckon from original maps, first deeds in 1900). The walls are constructed of a black plaster that is brittle to the touch and looks somewhat like pumice - it has a construction that looks like small balls held together. There is then lath and plaster over the top of this material.

How should we go about fixing the walls. At the moment, we have left a few old boards in as props. Should we floor underneath and cement the bottom, or should we try and attach a wood strip of original height to the joists below. Or should we get a builder in for advice?

Cheers

Tim

[Set Square]

I think you'd better find out *exactly* what the walls are made of. Your description sounds to me like timber which has been almost entirely eaten by woodworm. If this is the case, you won't have to worry about *fixing* the walls - you'll need to *replace* them!

It sounds like a thorough expert examination of *all* timber in the house may be in order, if it hasn't already been done.

[Tim]

Looks to me like plaster made with ash rather than woodworm. We've had all the timber checked and treated and will be treating the ptg with vast quantities of boron based treatment.

The black material can be crushed between your fingers in a similar fashion to plaster and produces black gritty powder like charcoal and sand mixed together

[The Natural Philosopher]

Yerrrs.. Somewhere in my memory this rings a bell.

It could simply be some early form of 'cinder block' - lime mortar loaded up with clinker or the like.

Up to you whetther having replaced the floor, you build new walls altgother, or simply strut up to to te walls and infillwith e.g. expanding foam.

If the original walls are 'interesing' i'd patch them - but new studwork and plasterboard - especially if you dry line with paper rather than skim - is pretty cheap and easy.

[meow2222]

Period property issues are not uk.d-i-y's forte. Try here:

[Chris Bacon]

I don't understand this - do you mean that you replaced the boards and now there's a few mm gap under walls, i.e. that the walls were built up on the floorboards?

[Tim]

Exactly - we have about 10mm between the new boards and the floor now. The walls were built on the old boards. Worst of all, the old boards were only a couple of mm from where the stairwell was cut so I've had to replaster the stairwell having disturbed the walls there :(