Our house was built in the late 20's. It had 3 small bedrooms and we are combining two of them to make one large(r) room. Our floors are not in real bad shape. We would like to refinish the hardwood floors in the bedroom. How do you reduce the amount of squeaking when the ceiling below is enclosed? Where the closets were, the floor is higher. Should we spend more time sanding that area or should we just put in new flooring?
Answer:
Before you do anything, use the appropriate fasteners to hold down the flooring that's there. If there are no gaps, just squeaks, 2.5" spiral finishing nails should do it. If you plan to cover what's there, wood screws through the sub-flooring and into the joists does a good job. In order for the varying heights to really give you a problem, they'll have to be at least .75" deflected.
