Karen,

Read your profile...nice to know that you worked in flooring.

The floors of those cottages with diagonal subflooring are prone to squeak. I learned that early on when learning the trade.

So, from your post I understand that the oak strip floor you have now is not worth restoring, is that right?

What I do to silence a squeaking floor where a new product is to be installed over is to first locate the heating system expansion tank (if you heat by hot water radiation). You do not want to have to call in a plumber to replace it due to an accidental nail penetration.

Then, locate the joists. You want to nail through the two layers of flooring and penetrate the joists with screw-type or what is also called spiral hardened flooring nails. You can tell if you've hit a joist by the solid sound it makes as you pound in the nails. You'll also get familiar with the noise made when you miss.

Wear safety glasses when pounding these hardened nails. You could use quality deck screws, but these nails screw themselves in and do a fine job.

If you took up the oak layer, then you could find the joists real easy and definitely fasten the remaining diagonal subflooring absolutely tight. That also gives you the opportunity to clinch any loose common nails by driving a screw nail immediately next to the common one (it is these common nails that cause most of the noise, although the oak top layer could as well.

Good luck with whatever you decide to do.

Glenn

Are the joists accessible from below? I had a case where the diagonal subfloor was nailed with cut nails. If a cut nail loosens even a bit, it then is really loose. The squeaks I found were loose subfloor boards. I had a big box of outdated business cards. Took urethane glue, like Gorilla glue, and squirted some on a card, then stuck it in the gap between the joist and the subfloor, continued this, stacking the cards, until the gaps were filled. It worked wonders and is still effective.

Now that is a very clever technique as described by bus driver. The urethane glue expands a little as it cures and I can see how it might tighten looseness in subfloor planks by essentially preventing the subfloor from deflecting downward when subjected to pressure from above. A similar thing can be achieved by driving shims between the loose planks and the joists, but you do run the risk of overdriving the shims and creating other problems.

Thanks for the advice everyone. Glenn - yeah, I know I should take up the oak but.... bleh, I just don't have the energy to make a huge mess of my house. I haven't updated my profile in forever, I now also have twin toddlers that I stay at home with so I have very little energy and even less spare time to deal with remodeling right now. We do not have hot water heating and there are no other pipes in the area I'll be working on so no worries there. The oak is just trashed. There are gaps wider than the thickness of a nickel between almost every piece and they don't close with the changes in the seasons. And several of the strips are cracked so all in all, not worth trying to fix it. The oak in the adjacent bedroom turned out pretty well and has no splits and very few gaps. Go figure, maybe the original installer got tired and when he got to the hallway he got sloppy?

Bus Driver - yes I have access to the joists from the basement. I didn't want to use the shim method but your "card trick" sounds interesting. Thanks!

Karen