Lifting first floor floorboards and insulating ??

[Stoatman]

Hi all,

I just wanted ask peoples advice on here about lifting our first floor floorboards and placing some dense rockwool underneath. Both for sound and thermal insualtion, our house has none at the moment. I have a few questions hopefully people can answer :

1) Is lifting floor boards easy ?
2) can they be reused after or do you need to buy new ?
3) When laying the insulation is it imperative to suspend it above the ceiling layer below - using nails or chicken wire etc - or can it be laid directly on top ?
4) Can you just take up every say one in three boards or do they all need to come up ?

Any advice would be appreciated .


Thanks

Chris

[27neth]

Hi,
Taking the floorboards up is not easy, its all tongue and grooved together. They may also go under your walls, door frames etc, so you will have to cut the boards off in the centre of the nearest joist. Its best to use a circular saw with the blade set at the same depth as the thickness as your floorboards.Then use a crow-bar, hammer, chisel etc. If your taking up a large area buy a length of 4"x2" to use to lever them up.
They can be reused but depends how much damage you cause to them.. The nails have a good grip and the boards can split. Also watch out for pipes and cables...
The insulation i guess you can just stuff it in, theres no chicken wire etc holding it up in your roof space..

John.....

[Stoatman]

Hmm, it does sound like a massive PITA and I dont want to have to be shelling out for new floor boards. I really want to do it, but dont know if it will be worth it. Even if i get our local joiner bloke to do it for me.