You want to apply new flooring in that old kitchen but the house has settled over the many decades and the floor is now wavy, sunken or just sloped to one side. If the floor became this way because of deterioration or insect infestation, of course the whole floor must be rebuilt properly, but if the floor system is actually sound and it just settled unevenly, this article is for you. Whatever the reason the floor has settled irregular, you can repair it back to a flat condition without having to rebuild. This article is going to help you with this process. You can use the following steps to fix your floor easily. Even after this you get any difficult you can contact Tru Appliance Repair that are professional that are there to help your repair problems.
Remove existing floorcovering to expose a sturdy subfloor. Attach wire lath ( stucco wire ) , to the low areas of the floor using galvanized nails or staples every 6″. Most wire lath is sold in sheets approx. 27″ x 96″ and cuts easily with snips. Mix sand mix or topping mix with a concrete mixture additive instead of water to create a better bond when installed in a thin application. Apply material at low areas and using a “screed board”.( Any straight 2×4 will work for your screed board.) Simply cut your screed board to a length about 6″ longer than the area you are filling in. If you are doing a wide area, you will need two persons. One at each end of the 2×4 screed board.
After dumping concrete sand mixture over wire lath, start at one end and holding your screed board in the center, work it back and forth from left to right while slightly dragging the board toward you. As the excess material develops behind the screed board, remove it and place it further down the area you are filling in. Let the modified cement mixture fill in the voids but do not apply too thin at edges. Keep material to at least 3/8″ thick at edges. Allow to dry and the next day apply thinset cement ( same used for tile ) over the remainder of the wire mesh edges and the balance of the floor to be screeded under 3/8″ thick. It’s also a good idea to apply concrete bonding agent to whatever subfloor is exposed to assure proper bonding of thinset cement.
You will have to screed in the opposite direction with thinset cement to get all the ridges out from the first cement application if you are using a vinyl or thinner floorcovering. If you are installing tile or stone, you can now lay the flooring pieces directly to the cement underlayment with modified thinset. If you prefer to install hardwood flooring, you can use glue down engineered flooring or a “floating-floor” such as Pergo.
Whatever the product you decide to install as your finished floor, it will be without all those highs and lows of the old floor below.
