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The day I learned to never trust a homeowner's 'level' floor

Last month I was hanging board in a kitchen remodel over in the West End. The guy swore his subfloor was perfect, said he checked it himself. I started on the far wall, got three sheets up, and my 4-foot level showed a half-inch dip running right through the middle of the room. Had to pull everything down, shim the entire run with strips of 30-pound felt, and start over. Lost a whole afternoon because someone's idea of 'level' was eyeballing it from the doorway. The worst part was he stood there watching me fix it, saying 'it looked fine to me.' What's your go-to method for checking a floor before you even bring the sheets in?

3 comments

3 Comments

nancy4752mo ago

Maybe the homeowner just has a different idea of what "perfect" means.

alex_johnson2mo ago

Totally, @nancy475! It's wild how often we all see the same thing and walk away with totally different ideas of what's "good" or "finished.

fiona_young2mo ago

Respectfully though, "looked fine from the doorway" isn't the same as being flat enough to hang drywall over. A half inch dip over 4 feet means the homeowner either didn't actually check or used a 2-foot level and called it good. My rule is to always run a 6-foot straightedge across the whole floor in both directions before cutting any tape, and if I find a low spot bigger than 1/8 inch, I mark it with chalk and figure out the best fix before the first board goes up.