How To Strengthen Your Attic Floor

How to make floor joists stronger.

How to strengthen your attic floor.

The best way to lay a floor in your loft for storage is to lay floor board panels. To floor an attic you ll need to install a sub floor for support before laying your plywood floor. Long spans of joists in newer homes may wobble or bounce from foot traffic. After several centuries of service floor joists in older homes may sag or crack.

We show you how to lay out tongue and groove loft boards in your loft supporting them on joists for a secure storage floor. In massachusetts attic floors must support at least 30 lbs ft live load the same as bedroom floors if the attic is accessed by means of a fixed stairway 780 cmr 5502 3 1 use a span table to determine the necessary joist dimensions given their span length spacing wood species and grade. Mike embarks on a project to lay a floor in the attic loft space. Flooring in the loft or attic how to lay tongue and groove board panel loft flooring.

Mike embarks on a project to lay a floor in the attic loft space. Doing so the wrong way means that you could weaken your structure squash your insulation or find yourself with one foot planted firmly through the sheetrock ceiling below. However flooring your attic can make it a perfect place for storage. Strengthening attic joists for live loads by sistering.

First you ll need to measure the area you want to floor so you can calculate how much wood you ll require. Flooring your attic is the best way to add space to your home at a low cost. Start with the attic floor. Fortunately there are attic flooring solutions that work well in the often harsh and unheated.

If the attic joists are not adequate one way to strengthen the floor for live loads is to sister the old joists. Stop using your attic for storage. Sistering is the process of adding a new joist next to each existing joist. But if the floor is covered in plywood you can t stuff enough insulation beneath it to do the job sufficiently not even in warm climates.