Where to buy proper floorboards?

[LFS19]

Presumably that white along the top of the plaster is okay?

Slightly paranoid :O


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[MikeJhn]

I presume you mean the white filler along the top of the skirting, in all probability that is Polyfiller and nothing to worry about, it will just knock off with a flat blade run down the wall.

Mike

 

[skipdiver]

It'll be from a caulking gun most likely and will scrape off. Looks like there is nothing there to be afraid of. Remove all the old paper, fit new skirtings and redecorate, you'll be fine. Don't know if the plaster has been sealed but it may pay to do that with a thinned down coat of emulsion before you put whatever you are putting on the wall.

 

[skipdiver]

Not heard of asbestos in plaster. Artex yes.

And guess who's probably moving to a house with Artex ceilings

Tempted to plasterboard over and get it reskimmed. The plus side of removing it is that I can see where pipes run etc.

Best to leave alone and skim over it. You could board over it but we just used to knock off the high spots with a big scraper and skim straight over the lot. Needs a couple of thick coats of plaster to conceal.

 

[LFS19]

Sorry I should've explained myself more. I was meaning the white on the actual plaster rather than the filler on the top, if that's what you were both referring to; if you can see its greyer at the bottom and then white higher up. I'm probably being paranoid. I have pretty bad health anxiety so my mind starts racing. I've been looking at all the photos I've put up trying to decern if anything looks suspicious, haha, such as that which I've mentioned and also the plaster I took off with the horse hair, the lath and plaster area.

I would've thought though if the animal hair was used as the thickener, there wouldn't be any asbestos, hopefully.
I read that also lots of different fibre types were used in the plaster and sometimes what you're looking at is asbestos.


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[skipdiver]

I wondered if that is what you meant but went with the obvious. It's nowt to worry about. Could be trowel marks or wallpaper paste, maybe a bit of efflorescence or bloom as some call it. If it's loose, brush it off and seal it.

 

[MikeJhn]

Not heard of asbestos in plaster. Artex yes.

And guess who's probably moving to a house with Artex ceilings

Tempted to plasterboard over and get it reskimmed. The plus side of removing it is that I can see where pipes run etc.

Best to leave alone and skim over it. You could board over it but we just used to knock off the high spots with a big scraper and skim straight over the lot. Needs a couple of thick coats of plaster to conceal.

Probably typing to fast I think you actually meant Contain, not conceal? concealing Asbestos is illegal, if you feel like changing it, I will delete this post, not trying to be a smart a**e.

Mike

 

[skipdiver]

I meant concealing the pattern of the artex, which can take a lot of plaster if it is a design with a heavy relief. Plastering over is safer than removing in my view.

 

[LFS19]

I wondered if that is what you meant but went with the obvious. It's nowt to worry about. Could be trowel marks or wallpaper paste, maybe a bit of efflorescence or bloom as some call it. If it's loose, brush it off and seal it.

Fair enough, that's good then I'll do that; thanks.

Hopefully the other thing in the lath and plaster is just horse hair or other fibre. I heard someone say that it was a lime and horse hair plaster.


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[LFS19]

We have what looks to be artex in the bay windows of the house and We just left it alone.
Luckily it wasn't over the whole sealing; only the bay so it doesn't even notice.
Hope it's not too much of a hassle for you, Roger.

 

[MikeJhn]

Couple of pics to illustrate taller floorboards with CH pipes and sockets in them.





Mike

 

[LFS19]

Just a last couple of areas I'm worried about. Do these look okay? It's the white I'm concerned about. I presumed it to be just a coating but it seems like an actual layer on the plaster
I looked online and apparently asbestos was sometimes used in the skim; not sure whether that's in this country though.
Also that area on the last photo.
Apologies for banging on about this. Just on alert now because of all I've read.

Ordered the skirting boards so they should be here soon. I think the area will need sealing as skip suggested ..

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[MikeJhn]

Nobody can tell you if the areas you are concerned about contain Asbestos from Photographs, there is only one way to be sure and that is to have it tested, very expensive and will just feed you current state of paranoia, no offence intended, when Asbestos first started to be used in the Construction Industry it was expensive and was only used commercially because of that, when surveying domestic buildings I always worked on the adage that it the building was built in the 50's/60's it would contain Asbestos in some form or another, but not prior to that date, looking at your pic's I am making a big assumption here that your house is Victorian, in which case I would not expect to find Asbestos in any great quantities for a number of reasons, mainly that any that was used during the prolific use period would have long gone due to renovations and alterations in the interveaning period.

Just one other thing, White Asbestos is a designation of its type, it does not neccesaraly mean it will be white in colour.

Mike

 

[LFS19]

Nobody can tell you if the areas you are concerned about contain Asbestos from Photographs, there is only one way to be sure and that is to have it tested, very expensive and will just feed you current state of paranoia, no offence intended, when Asbestos first started to be used in the Construction Industry it was expensive and was only used commercially because of that, when surveying domestic buildings I always worked on the adage that it the building was built in the 50's/60's it would contain Asbestos in some form or another, but not prior to that date, looking at your pic's I am making a big assumption here that your house is Victorian, in which case I would not expect to find Asbestos in any great quantities for a number of reasons, mainly that any that was used during the prolific use period would have long gone due to renovations and alterations in the interveaning period.

Just one other thing, White Asbestos is a designation of its type, it does not neccesaraly mean it will be white in colour.

Mike

No offence taken; I certainly am paranoid about it!

The house was built in the 30's, and that room was done I think anywhere from the. 60's to 80's. Can't find anything in the plans about it, but the extension to the kitchen and the room above are not original.

That's good then. I've been probably unnecessarily stressing over anything white in the room..
I wouldn't really be bothered but you read these stories on the internet of how exposure to a couple of fibres can lead to an early death 30 or so years down the line..
On then reading that the room was likely built within the time period it's use was most prevalent; and I've been in there doing work for about a week now, it's put me very much on edge.

Thanks for the reassurance.


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[MikeJhn]

I wish I had thirty years left to be paranoid about. 8)

Mike

 

[LFS19]

I'm actually unsure now of whether that room is in fact an extension. Looking at the outside of the building, the brickwork appears to be identical and just as worn as the rest of the house, as does the roofing.

I quite like these investigatory searches through the plans - it's interesting to see the history (providing you don't find out something hideous! )


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[skipdiver]

The lath and plaster is original and wouldn't have been used in a modern-ish extension. If it's any consolation LFS, the most dangerous forms of asbestos are blue and brown types but i wouldn't get too paranoid about white asbestos because as Mike points out, the colour is just a designation and not necessarily that colour in reality. As a joiner, i am in the highest risk group for developing asbestosis, which i was told by a member of DASH, which is the Derbyshire Asbestos Support Team. I try not to dwell on it because as a young man, we knew nothing of the dangers and i may well go on to develop the condition, or i may not. If you are worried, you can get it tested but it will be majorly expensive.

 

[LFS19]

The lath and plaster is original and wouldn't have been used in a modern-ish extension. If it's any consolation LFS, the most dangerous forms of asbestos are blue and brown types but i wouldn't get too paranoid about white asbestos because as Mike points out, the colour is just a designation and not necessarily that colour in reality. As a joiner, i am in the highest risk group for developing asbestosis, which i was told by a member of DASH, which is the Derbyshire Asbestos Support Team. I try not to dwell on it because as a young man, we knew nothing of the dangers and i may well go on to develop the condition, or i may not. If you are worried, you can get it tested but it will be majorly expensive.

Thanks for the post.
So when you say modern-ish, what sort of time period are we talking?

Regarding possible time period,
I've learned some more about the house after locating some old plans.

That area along the wall we've been talking about where you said it looked like something had been removed, was a shower cubicle which would've been taken out in the mid 90's.
In the 80's, the house was an old people's home and many of the bedrooms had showers in them.

This is the first I've ever seen as far as graphics of the original floor plan.
As you can see, The older drawing from 1983 shows the proposed plan to build an extension onto the kitchen, and the newer sheet shows the state of the house in 1995, and that they were to demolish the extension of the breakfast room and study built in the 80s; in favour of a garden and garage as it is today.

Something interesting I saw was that on the older drawing, the graphic labelled "existing plan" shows a wall that's no longer here.
What is now our rather large kitchen was divided into a kitchen and a dining area with a wall and door in-between.

The reason I've been saying the room I'm redoing and the part of the kitchen that sits below it were extensions is because I'd never seen a 1930s house with such a large kitchen. We just presumed it was extended at some point.
Turns out I was wrong, and that the kitchen we have now was indeed the kitchen & dining room for the original house.

It appears, then, that the room I'm redoing isn't actually an extension at all if I'm right with what I've seen.
If it's not, that should date the room as 1930's, providing it wasn't added on some other time.

Hopefully then the room should be clear of the prolific asbestos period Mike was talking about.
If that is the case, the only area I can think of that might be of concern is whatever they did whilst patching up that area when they removed the shower room. However, this will have been after 1995, so hopefully (considering it's past the time it was supposed to be banned) that means I'm clear there also.

And I see, that's good that they have support groups available for that sort of thing.
Wishing you the very best.

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[skipdiver]

The lath and plaster wall tells me that it is not an extension as they wouldn't have used that in the 80's or 90's. The plan confirms that and it gives you some ideas to how houses get altered over the decades to suit their purpose at the time. My house was also built in the 30's and to my surprise, has breeze block internal walls. They are a very crumbly type that were probably made from waste of the steelworks up the road, though i'm just guessing there.

 

[LFS19]

The lath and plaster wall tells me that it is not an extension as they wouldn't have used that in the 80's or 90's. The plan confirms that and it gives you some ideas to how houses get altered over the decades to suit their purpose at the time. My house was also built in the 30's and to my surprise, has breeze block internal walls. They are a very crumbly type that were probably made from waste of the steelworks up the road, though i'm just guessing there.

Indeed.
Annoyingly I don't have an plans prior to this one from 1983, so who knows then when These separate shower rooms were added.

Presumably the removal of the shower room is why the wall seems to have been patched up with plaster board, and the laths are only visible in the first quadrant of the wall next to the door frame.

The house has had thousands of pounds worth of repair work done since the mid 80's when I've looked at the plans, So I'm surprised there's so much that needs doing and has been done by us. We only moved here in 2010 and we've spent a heck of a lot since then.

Something quite unbelievable is that the previous owners paid £2000 in 1998 to solve the sulphur leaching problem.
A problem we've just spend £1000 rectifying...

These old houses are beautiful but damn do they have their issues; as I'm sure you'll have also experienced.


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