Skirting on uneven (I.e. not flat) wall?

[albaPhenom]

Fitting the skirting in a room following a plaster skim and things were going well until this wall.

It’s flat at the other side and remains flat until about the last 500mm or so and then dips drastically by at least 20mm.

It’s big enough to fit another skirting down the back of it.

What’s the best way to deal with this situation?

 

[foxhole]

You could undercut the plaster where it does touch the wall until it goes in, or Mechanically fix at the last point it touches the wall and then again midway from the end to bend it in, probably need some caulk if there still be a slight gap.Or a combination of both .

 

[Deleted member 174758]

As @foxhole says, chop out the bottom of the skirting near floor level (lump hammer and an electrician's bolster chisel are good for this sort of thing), then fix your skirting with foam rather than construction adhesive, as that will be better in this instance. If absolutely necessary it can help to ease the back of the skirting with a power planer to get the last few millimetres of adjustment. Caulk any remaining gap at the top with deco caulk

 

[albaPhenom]

You could undercut the plaster where it does touch the wall until it goes in, or Mechanically fix at the last point it touches the wall and then again midway from the end to bend it in, probably need some caulk if there still be a slight gap.Or a combination of both .

As @foxhole says, chop out the bottom of the skirting near floor level (lump hammer and an electrician's bolster chisel are good for this sort of thing), then fix your skirting with foam rather than construction adhesive, as that will be better in this instance. If absolutely necessary it can help to ease the back of the skirting with a power planer to get the last few millimetres of adjustment. Caulk any remaining gap at the top with deco caulk

I can bend the end of the board until it touches the wall (leaves a slight gap still at the midpoint) but there's a lot of tension in the board when I do this which I fear would just pull any fixing out of the wall (I'm only fixing into plaster here), unless I mech fix with a c/sunk screw to a small timber batten and put a dowel in to hide it?

I'm not sure I'm following the other advise though, are you saying to chop out the plaster from behind the skirting or the bottom of the skirting board?

I have some low expansion foam there... I'll add some more pics to show the full skirting length.

 

[albaPhenom]

 

[albaPhenom]

Doesn’t help that the floor dips by about 8-12mm at that point either.

 

[Deleted member 267285]

Doesn’t help that the floor dips by about 8-12mm at that point either.

Might just have to put some wedges in, unless you want to lift and pack up joists and floorboards?

Regards the skirting on uneven wall, are you sure it’s not that cable holding it off? Try carefully removing that chunk of plaster/bonding where the cable is.

 

[albaPhenom]

Might just have to put some wedges in, unless you want to lift and pack up joists and floorboards?

Regards the skirting on uneven wall, are you sure it’s not that cable holding it off? Try carefully removing that chunk of plaster/bonding where the cable is.

Yeah I’m gonna wedge it at the bottom, packing up the floorboards would be the best option but they shoot under a stud wall at that point and it would be a pain the *** cutting the boards to level them all

Oh yeah and it’s 100% the wall, I’ve chopped away all the plaster there and the cable ticks away neatly but the whole wall very noticeably drops off… I think back in the day this last section of wall belonged to the room next door but they moved the internal partition to enlarge this room slightly and that’s probably where the problem began.

That back box for the switch is sitting proud of the wall too, the plasterer never bothered to mention that when he skimmed it.

Another problem for tomorrow.

 

[Deleted member 174758]

I'm not sure I'm following the other advise though, are you saying to chop out the plaster from behind the skirting or the bottom of the skirting board?

Ideally, you need to install skirting board as plumb (vertical) as possible, so that it looks right and so that you don't end up struggling with the internal corner scribes. You also want the gap, if any, between the top of the skirting and the plaster to be no more than 3 or 4mm. Finally, you need to support the skirting board when it has been installed so that it stays put if someone accidentally kicks it.

As far as I can see your wall has two separate, and fairly common, issues. Firstly, the bottom of the plastered wall "kicks out", thus (exaggerated for effect in Dwg A):

It is this "kick out" which needs to be got rid of - and for that I tend to be quite brutal and fast by using a club (lump) hammer and an electrician's bolster chisel to pare back the plasterwork below the top of the skirting level. It doesn't need to be pretty because it will never be seen, but the end result is that you should be able to get your skirting tight in to the plasterwork, or at worst to within a few millimetres (as in Dwg B, above). That small gap can then be filled with decorator's acrylic caulk

I have some low expansion foam there... I'll add some more pics to show the full skirting length.

The second issue is that you have a missing strip of plaster at the very bottom of the wall (see Dwg B, above). You could fill this, but it's often a waste of effort, and in rooms like bathrooms the result could be water wicking up the plasterwork in the event of, say, a bath overflowing. So a better way is to fill it with something which will both fill the gap and stick the plasterboard in place - a grip adhesive or a low expansion adhesive foam (for anyone else reading this who isn't familiar with it, which is NOT the same as expanding foam).

If the wall has an end to end bow in the wall you'd normally need to fix the skirting to the wall in some way starting at one end and creeping along to the other, In trade work we often use a 2nd fix nailer for this, providing there is something to fix to (even 16 ga nailers won't go into solid brickwork). Fixing with foam you can do this by simply putting weights (e.g. blockwork wrapped in cardboard, timber battens screwed to sub-floor, heavy books inside a plastic bag - but no first editions unless they're some of Mad Nad's!, tool boxes, etc) which are left in place until the foam has set.

 

[Deleted member 174758]

Yeah I’m gonna wedge it at the bottom, packing up the floorboards would be the best option but they shoot under a stud wall at that point and it would be a pain the *** cutting the boards to level them all

Oh yeah and it’s 100% the wall, I’ve chopped away all the plaster there and the cable ticks away neatly but the whole wall very noticeably drops off… I think back in the day this last section of wall belonged to the room next door but they moved the internal partition to enlarge this room slightly and that’s probably where the problem began.

That back box for the switch is sitting proud of the wall too, the plasterer never bothered to mention that when he skimmed it.

Another problem for tomorrow.

Actually, to deal with a "hump" in a floor, a more professional way is to scribe to the floor. Start by packing up the skirting at both ends so that each end is exactly (well more or less) the same distance above the floor. Take a pencil and a couple of packers, offcut of wood, etc and run a scribe line along the bottom edge of the skirting. Trim back to the scribe line with a jigsaw (or even a block plane or belt sander) incorporating a bit of back clearance. Really not too difficult. Drop in the skirting and see how it fits to the floor. You may need to do a couple of progressivly heavier cuts to get it right, but if it helps your carpet should at least hide a few millimetres gap. This deals with humps in the middle of a floor and very importantly leaves your skirting at the right height at the ends where it will probably meet another piece of skirting at a corner. Not an uncommon task in older properties

Hope that makes sense

BTW if the cable is holding the skirting off the wall at the bottom, remove some of the back of the skirting with a power planer or a hand plane to make some clearance

 

[albaPhenom]

@JobAndKnock

Don’t think your drawings loaded mate but I’m sure I follow.

With regards to plaster kick out at the bottom, I’ve knocked most of this back already with a wood chisel, the skirting sits fairly tight until it hits the point where the wall drops back.

I’m already using 40-50mm lost head nails fixed thru the little groove where the Ogee starts… no Brad nailer unfortunately, just a hammer and nail punch.

So what I want do is

1- lay the board flat and apply grip fill.
2 - apply low expansion foam at the end where the wall drops off.
3 - offer the board up and nail along to where the skirting board is no longer touching wall.
4- Push it back against the wall and screw a batten to the floor in front of it.
5 - fix a few more nails in the bent section for good measure?

Is that about right?

 

[Deleted member 174758]

Yes, but skip the GripFil - the foam will do all the work. You will also need to ensure that you hold the top edge of the skirting into the plaster (with weights).

You may have missed my previous post about scribing to the floor, so take a look. Either way I'd still consider taking some of the bottom of the skirting out and getting at least a partial scribe to the floor if you can, that way the floor covering stands a better chance of hiding the gap. Out of interest, if the skirting is MDF or thinner softwood you can actually flex it to the floor (providing the variation isn't too sudden) by planting one end of a 400 to 600mm long offcut of skirting on the top edge of the skirting you are fitting, with thecother end on the floor, standing on the board to force the skirting down to the floor, fixing it in place, then moving along a bit and repeating until you get to the end, but this technique does require (i) something to fix into and (ii) a 16 gauge 2nd fix nail gun (I've tried it with 18 gauge and the pins tend to bend too easily). Also helps if you're a heavy so and so
.
BTW I reloaded my scrawls above

 

[albaPhenom]

Actually, a more professional way is to scribe to the floor. Pack up the skirting at both ends so that each end is packed-up exactly (well more or less) the same amount. Take a pencil and a couple of packers, offcut of wood, etc and run a scribe line along the bottom edge of the skirting. Trim back to the scribe line with a jigsaw (or even a block plane or belt sander) with a bit of back clearance. Really not too difficult. Drop in and see where it sits. You may need to do a couple of progressive cuts to get it right, but if it helps your carpet should hide a few millimetres gap. This deals with humps in the middle of a floor and very importantly leaves your skirting at the right height at the ends where it will probably meet another piece of skirting at a corner. Not an uncommon task in old properties

Hope that makes sense

BTW if the cable is holding the skirting off the wall at the bottom, take some of the back of the skirting out with a power planer or a hand plane to give it some clearance

Used a block plane to scribe the hump in the middle, sits a lot better now, not perfect but enough the carpet will hide any gaps.

Down to one problem, the drop off in the wall.

 

[albaPhenom]

Yes, but skip the GripFil - the foam will do all the work. You will also need to ensure that you hold the top edge of the skirting into the plaster (with weights).

You may have missed my previous post about scribing to the floor, so take a look. Either way I'd still consider taking some of the bottom of the skirting out and getting at least a partial scribe to the floor if you can, that way the floor covering stands a better chance of hiding the gap. Oiut of interest if the skirting is MDF or thinner softwood you can actually flex it to the floor by planting a 400 to 600mm long offcut of skirting in top of the skirting you are fitting, standing on the board to force the skirting down to the floor, fixing it in place, then moving along a bit and repeating until you get to the end, but this technique does require (i) something to fix into and (ii) a 16 gauge 2n fix nail gun (I've tried it with 18 gauge and the pins tend to bend too easily). Also helps if you're a heavy so and so
.
BTW I reloaded my scrawls above

Thanks @JobAndKnock , you’ve been a massive help mate.

Good as I’m gonna get it for now I think.