How to fix squeaks in floor with no subfloor?

[Powermuffin]

Hi all. We have Doug Fir or Pine floors, very hard, laid directly on the joists. The main pathway from the front door to kitchen is full of squeaks. Since we are embarking on finishing the basement, we will need to take care of the squeaks soon. Any ideas on how to do it?
Thanks,
Diane

[phil]

you can face nail somewhat, walk around and get down on the floor and see where the flooring moves exactly. You can only screw to the joist since thats all you have.
I haven't' tried these but they might be good.

https://www.lowes.com/pd/Squeeeeek-No-M ... ge/4441839

they are screws designed to break off just below the surface. or if you use nails you can set them , and then putty them or if it is a finished floor maybe just use a wax crayon o the right color for hiding nail holes, just rub it in.
if you have access from below you can do more like perhaps driving screws at an angle ( like toenailing) to hit the joist and flooring without breaking through and that would leave no visible holes from above, but you'd need access. If you do have access you can also do this sort of thing:
https://woodgears.ca/home/bracing_diagram.jpg
it spreads the load among the other joist and stiffens the floor.

if you drive nails you can try intentionally angling them. if you drive two nails at different angles near each other its hard for them to pull out. sometimes the movement of the floor can actually push nails back out so I'd drive them at angles. then when the floor flexes it isn't just sliding up and down on the nail it is at an angle and that holds better.

you could also try tings like drilling little holes down through the flooring and just partly into the joist and then squirt glue down the holes to try to get some between the flooring and the top of the joist, and then use the holes for the screws after, to pull it tight while the glue is wet.

usually all the boards dont' squeak so youll have to deternmine exactly which ones do and then youll have less nail holes. I'd go minimal and then walk around to see how it is and do more if you have to.

if you want to attack the issue from below I'd see if you can get someone to help find the squeaky spots. you need someone to walk around while the other feels and listens from below.

here's another trick. drill a small hole smaller than your nails at an angle and drive a nail in following the hole. set the nail in fairly deep like 1/8th or so. then drill using the same hole but a different angle. you can put a second nail down and set it. The result : Two nails at different angles, but only one nail hole
- don't do that on casings and things you might take apart again it will lock them together kind of permanently and maybe cause some damage if you want to take it apart again later. But if you do a few that way, I mean,, If you are pulling up that flooring you have bigger issues and destroying the flooring would likely be par for the course at that point.

my attic is like that. 2x4 joist then no shiplap, but its fine. the main floor has super heavy joist. its just the way it was designed, maybe the attic wasn't going to be living space at the initial construction / design phase, I'm not sure.

another option could be to cut plywood strips the width of the joist space and set that up against the floor, then you can drive some screws to hit the joist and others right up into the flooring from below but not breaking the surface.

I dont; mind a few squeaks, it's like having an early warning system

[Manalto]

Would thin wedges help?

[Powermuffin]

Thanks for the replies.
These are not quiet squeaks, they are loud and almost every board squeaks along the path. I am also worried that this is weakening the floor boards. I have nailed some, didn't seem to help even though I hit the joists. I will see what kind of screws I might be able to use that won't show so much.

Since we are working on the basement, I wonder if sistering the joists along the path might help?

[phil]

it might but then how do you attach the flooring , more nails or screws from above?

this isnt' structural so much as a sound you get because the flooring is moving just a tad as it bends when you step on it and when the board rub together you get an audible noise. I guess it's the main floor and no subfloor so they saved a bit on wood wen they built your house. but that doesnt' necessarily mean its weak and dangerous or anything.

In my living room I just re-sanded and exposed a lot of nails so I drove them deeper to use putty to hide them, that is tightening the queaks up too but its an odd way to tighten the floor.

im filling that joist space with roxul and using 5/8th fireproof in the basement in case I want a suite some day , otherwise it won't pass inspection if you use 1/2" also the heat needs to be separate but I figure I can do that with electric.

anyway see what others come up with. driving wedges might work on particular spots if you know the floor is out of contact with joist at certain spots and flexing there as a result but you don't really want to drive a bunch in and separate that joint either. but you could perhaps use a wedge to get a little gap to get glue between. maybe PL glue or something like that. sistering the joist is another way of adding strength.

or you could just sister 2x2 then you could nail to the joist and also screw up into the flooring with the correct length as to not penetrate. if you did that then you could smear them in glue before install? less wood that way and it still adds at least a little strength. you only have less than 3/4 to bite into with the screws but it still might work? the glue would do most of it, the screws would suck things together.

you have to immagine the worst case which might be a big party where everyone gets attracted to one room so they are all standing shoulder to shoulder filling the room. your floor needs to have enough strength for that but you might be there already? I dont' know. thats structural engineer stuff.

if they are 2x8 joist and fir they are probably pretty strong and my opinion is that you hear the floor flexing but that really hasn't changed the strength of the structure it is just annoying you and you understandably want to fix it before closing up.

[Olson185]

Hi all. We have Doug Fir or Pine floors, very hard, laid directly on the joists. The main pathway from the front door to kitchen is full of squeaks. Since we are embarking on finishing the basement, we will need to take care of the squeaks soon. Any ideas on how to do it?
Thanks,
Diane

We kept the circa 1940 pine flooring, for the kitchen, and my wife's heels are giving them a hand-scraped look.

Are your squeaks seasonal?

We don't have a finished basement anymore (but still have baseboard heating which we keep around 58F) and notice squeaks occur primarily in the Winter. That's when I would go about looking for them and fix using shims if the squeak is cause by the board riding up and down on a nail. If the squeak is away from a floor joist (FJ) obviously there's no place to put the shim.

I have seen, though not sure if I like, a 12"-16" wide piece of plywood glued and screwed to the bottom of flooring in an attempt to hold the flooring tightly down to the plywood. I think the short screws only serve to hold the plywood in place until the glue dries. I'm not advocating this. It might work. I just don't care for doing anything that can't be undone easily. Instead of plywood, I might use strips of 1x6 so I could pry it off.

[phil]

I dont really see harm in what olson describes above. Im sure it would work and the plywood isnt' a huge expense. If you wanted you might pick your glue so it is possible to pull it but would you really be opening your drywall to go inand pull it out ? why? I woudl think if the floor gets too worn ou the old floor will become the new subfloor and a new floor laid perpendicular right on top. But of course if it is saveable I'd save it because it is probably still a nice floor if it hasn't been sanded too far.

I was trying to face nail one spot and put nails on the joist near where I thought the squeak was , it didn't help and I jumped over to the next joist and put a couple more, then it stopped. maybe the board flexes and because all the nails are worn a bit loose it is sliding over it's entire length a little and maybe those nails further down the plank helped. It is hard to tell whats going on visually but if you put your finger between two boards and have someone walk around you'll probably see or feel very minute amounts of movement between the two. it doesn't have to move far to cause the squeak. whats described above might help the flex of the boards. With no subfloor when you walk on them there is some bowing going on. you might try to put a piece of tape over the crack and then cut it with a knife along the crack and look with a magnifying glass, you might see it actually moving, and you might see the (now) two pieces of tape shift slightly in relation to each other. you could always just try the spot that bugs you most ? see how it goes and continue if it helps a lot? you dont'; need good plywood even , dont' waste your money on sanded perfect cabinet grade stuff, you won't see it anyway. If you want to stiffen the joist up The thing with the X pattern will help spread the load as would sistering but you'd still have that option. Its nicer if you dont' have to drive nails from above all over the place. I think the plywood would also help spread the load from one board to it's adjacent board so if they flex it would be bending both, and the plywood.

as a way of thinking about it if you were to stretch a piece of rope between two points and step on the rope, you can put tremendous force against the two attachment points of the rope.. so if you visualize that happening to the flooring, the board can't stretch and you might be shifting the board back and forth in relation to the next board, maybe only by thousandths of an inch but over time all the nails come a bit loose and allow it to move more and more.
so you can percieve that the board is moving by say 10 thousandths of an inch up and down as you walk on it.. the thickness of a matchbook cover.. but it is also moving lengthwise, only there it might only be a couple of thousandths, which is the thickness of a sheet of copy paper. very hard to see that small of a movement by eye but enough to create noise. basically one board isn't just moving up and down I think there is also some sliding action between them, its very tiny but you can hear the effect. we tend to think the board is just flexing up and down but then you realize it cant' stretch very easily along it's length.

you might also see some rust near the nails if the floor is thin enough. that may be from water getting to the nails if they put lyno down and water gets trapped between or just the nails wearing and minute particles of metal come loose.

as a comparison sometimes Ill see wear points in machinery that wasn't greased well, then near the bearing that should have been greased more often, Ill notice a rust colored deposit there. there is no water present other than in the air, but those minute particles from wear are so tiny they still rust just from the moisture in the air. the floor won't rust of course but the iron particles combine with the tannins in the wood and create a black stain. even without the nails exposed you'll often see little stains and they will all be over joist and near where the planks meet edge to edge. would the boards that are moving have darker stains? maybe?

[Powermuffin]

Thanks for the replies. No rusty nails - this is Colorado so "dry" is the usual weather forecast. Sounds to me like sistering something is the easiest plan.

We are having our favorite structural engineer come out to talk about finishing the basement and will talk to him about the floors too. The squeaks are not weather- or season-dependent. I don't want to replace these floors, not only because they are original, but also because they are beautiful and removing them would require removing the baseboards and sawing them out since they run under the walls. I have never heard such squeaky floors!

[Olson185]

Thanks for the replies. No rusty nails - this is Colorado so "dry" is the usual weather forecast. Sounds to me like sistering something is the easiest plan.

We are having our favorite structural engineer come out to talk about finishing the basement and will talk to him about the floors too. The squeaks are not weather- or season-dependent. I don't want to replace these floors, not only because they are original, but also because they are beautiful and removing them would require removing the baseboards and sawing them out since they run under the walls. I have never heard such squeaky floors!

Abbc3 Offtopic

Are you sure it's the floor squeaking? Depending on how old you are....

[phil]

Hopefully you don't hear chewing sounds too
Structural engineer, good plan.