Creaking floors and other woes

[Chuck Sidfrum]

Some good progress, albeit still very very slow, and lots of 1 step forward, 2 steps back.

Progress:-
It's now out in the open how Charles Church tried to put unsuitable fix onto home owners - by choosing investigating house with simplist issue on the estate just managing to get a marginal pass (although most seemed to disagree the fix was good enough, including engineers & managers), and then just sending in the workmen to roll out the same fix to other homes (albeit, they reduced the spec of that initial test case even further without admitting fact to home owners, so test case house actually had 25% more strenthening than they tried to put into other later homes). To complicate matters, the first house they did (as the original investigated/test bed house told residents it didn't work, and this caused problems for builders carefully laid plans) they put 75% more strengthening in that 2nd house (first actuall installation) than the test case house, which got some great pr to other home owners, and thus undermine the test case house owners opinions, and left people blindly picking the 25% less method.

Irrespective of the unsuitable fix, that only really solved the noise/crack/creak issues, another fix was to be tested though. This fix is far far superior, and solves the noise/cracks/creaks from floor and ceiling below, but has the added bonus of dramatically reducing the noise throughout the house, for example the sound of footsteps above or a flushing toilet. This new fix also resolved the bounce issues, to the point it feels like a concrete floor almost. In the original test case house one couldn't tell the difference (for bounce) between rooms with or without the test fix.

Be aware one will never get rid of all bounce, but the idea that 13mm deflection is ok is nonsense for the finished floor. Over 4m span a 1.3mm deflection the the maximum tolerance for an acceptable level of bounce feeling.

As it stands the successfull test of joist plating and solid blocking has now been offered to most home owners. Roughly a third of the estate is taking the new/better fix that addresses bounce as well. Many have accepted the original test idea unfortunately, albeit they don't seem to realise that they are being sold 25% less that what scraped a pass in the original test house. The second home, first completed (done after test house) had 75% more stenthening installed but the home owners accepting this fix did so blindly based on the results relayed to them and not having the differences declared openly for them to realise. To me this is comparable to a seller doing bait and switch. To complicate matter the builder dished the new and better fix (joist platting and solid blocking) making out it was no better than the original test case.

Those today and in future being sold on noggins, nailing, screwing, additional floor boards, bracing, etc should seek professional advice.

The answer, as known all along, has turned out to be joist plating and solid blocking. Thankfully the NHBC is now adopting this as a standard approved fix, and this I suspect could be valid not just if reported in first two years, but also in the first 10 years.

No Progress:-
But we are still waiting for investigational works, and simple remedial matters to be addressed, i.e. leaks. Now in our 5th year of complaining, this is quite frankly a disgrace on the part of the builder - although nothing to the manner in which they tried to fudge the investigations, that was a shocking surprise the lengths they would go to under current leadership.