Fixing skirting boards help!

[scottupham]

Hi all,

Looking to fix some new skirting this weekend. The walls have been replastered but I have about 10cm gap between bottom of plastered wall and floorboard level.

Whats the best way to fix the skirting? Do I need to pack out the gap between wall and floorboard so the skirting sits flush?

Thanks

 

[Mark M]

10cm seems a lot? How high is the new skirting?

 

[scottupham]

10cm is the highest gap, mostly about 7-8 cm probably. New skirting is 12cm.

 

[Mark A]

Yeah you'll need to pack the gap with some scraps of wood or something. Otherwise the screws will pull the bottom in. You might be lucky and a skirting offcut is the exact right size .

What I sometimes do when there is a big gap behind the skirting is to use expanding foam in the areas I want to put the screws. It expands in the cavity and will stop the board from pulling in when the fixings go in. Some people just use foam, but I dont trust it to hold the board if there is any movement in the timber.

 

[Millwall.FC]

Grip fill and some nails.

 

[Kimi]

I use Gripfill on skirting,

 

[mattyg]

Grip fill and some nails.

Just done a whole house using just those things.

Well a hammer and saw but you get the drift

 

[darreny]

Use gripfill or pink but white to glue packers in place leave for 24hrs then fit the skirting

 

[JohnnyG]

Use low expansion foam to fill the large areas then just nail in to it when dry.

 

[SkodaMart]

Combination of no nails, bits of wood packing and screws.

 

[bitslice]

the old method was to drill out bits of mortar between the bricks
hammer in one inch wooden pegs to the level of the wall
then screw the skirting to the end of the pegs.

this works well when the bottom of the wall is missing, like in this case

 

[Maccapacca]

Gripfill

 

[Adam_151]

I use these: http://www.screwfix.com/p/broadfix-glazing-packers-small-100-x-1-6-x-24mm-225-piece-set/96089

Use a straight edge to work out what combination of colours works at each point. Dob of silicon to keep them in place while you fix the skirting board in place

 

[LiGhTfasT]

I only used gripfill on mine and still stuck solid a few years on.

 

[darreny]

the old method was to drill out bits of mortar between the bricks
hammer in one inch wooden pegs to the level of the wall
then screw the skirting to the end of the pegs.

this works well when the bottom of the wall is missing, like in this case

Yeah but luckily modern adhesives have improved some of that method, depending on walls are straight (ish)

 

[Lopéz]

I use these: http://www.screwfix.com/p/broadfix-glazing-packers-small-100-x-1-6-x-24mm-225-piece-set/96089

Use a straight edge to work out what combination of colours works at each point. Dob of silicon to keep them in place while you fix the skirting board in place

I use Broadfix packers for all sorts of jobs. Very useful.

 

[scottupham]

Thanks for the advice, Managed to make up some packers with left over wood but a bit fiddly.

First two boards on ok, using gripfill.

Cheers for the advice.

 

[Participant]

Sorry if someone already asked / answered this, but why was there such a big gap? Was the plasterboard not taken down to the floorboards?

 

[scottupham]

Its solid walls so no plasterboard.

The gap between the wall and floorboards before the reskim were pretty deep so the plasterer just reskimmed down to to same level as the original plaster.

Not sure when we do the next room, whether to ask him to plaster down to floorboard level to reduce the gap.

 

[Skiddley]

I had the same, and it's normal. Plastering to floor can create damp issues.

I mechanically fixed my skirting using 6mm screws intro rawl plugs. Old house so walls aren't completely plumb. Something to consider before reaching for the gripfill.

I had about 350ft of 10" skirting to fit!!