Treat joists/floorboards after water damage

[dave134]

Hi, some advise on this please. I had a burst pipe on the cold water tank (above the bathroom) in the loft recently. The water was running for about 3 days and brought down the bathroom ceiling and the kitchen ceiling below, and soaked all the floorboards and joists.

I've removed the lath and plaster on both ceilings ready to reboard.
My question is, do I need to treat the floorboards/joists before reboarding or will they just dry out in time? I'm thinking of dry rot that might appear in the future.

Many thanks for any help.

 

[gregers]

imo i would leave the boarding up for as long as possible to allow the timbers to thoroughly dryout.
then once your sure then for peace of mind spray with a combined woodworm/dry rot fluid.then board.

 

[dave134]

imo i would leave the boarding up for as long as possible to allow the timbers to thoroughly dryout.
then once your sure then for peace of mind spray with a combined woodworm/dry rot fluid.then board.

Many thanks - that sounds good to me!

 

[joe-90]

Just let them dry. There is no chance of dry rot up there and there's no more chance of woodworm than there was before.

 

[dave134]

Just let them dry. There is no chance of dry rot up there and there's no more chance of woodworm than there was before.

Thanks for the reply. I'm confused now - I was getting ready to spray all the joists with preserver thinking they might start to rot having had a good soaking? They have started drying out quite nicely since I took down the old lathe and plaster and the air has got to them. Is that a waste of time?

 

[gregers]

Just let them dry. There is no chance of dry rot up there and there's no more chance of woodworm than there was before.

really?

i have ripped out quite a few properties where dry rot(worse case scenario here dave)has taken hold from a leak.on the 1st floor.
didnt know that dry rot new the rules of not starting above ground floor.
so do you give it a good telling off if it goes any higher then ground floor?

like any rot the conditions have to spot on for it to establish itself.
personally dave it will do you no harm in spraying,as said before peace of mind.
agree with the woodworm though

 

[joe-90]

Dry rot is extremely difficult to grow. It needs just the right dampness and humidity. It's far too dry in a first floor.

 

[gregers]

yeah ok,i must of been treating weeds then

have a look here for more info,
http://www.safeguardeurope.com/applications/dry_rot.php

 

[ladylola]

Agree with gregers here, dry rot can start anywhere. I've just worked in a large building in Wales where the timbers all seemed sound with very little rot of any sort, but, removing some dodgy plaster work on the first floor (3 story building) on an internal wall we found a lintel with dry rot and no obvious source of moisture. The micilliem will travel through brickwork to find any source of water.
That said Joe is also right or very nearly. There is a very very small chance that rot will set in, in truth the timbers weren't wet for long and simply drying them out is fine and treatment needs only to be put on if you really want complete piece of mind.
When I started work in the 80's we took a rather more aggressive approach to dry rot, it was all removed bricks removed until there was no more signs of milicilium and then further , plus all the joints were raked out, then sprayed and bricks soaked before being put in. Nowadays people like the National Trust don't like the use of chemicals and just rely on eliminating the source of damp.

 

[gregers]

Agree with gregers here, dry rot can start anywhere. I've just worked in a large building in Wales where the timbers all seemed sound with very little rot of any sort, but, removing some dodgy plaster work on the first floor (3 story building) on an internal wall we found a lintel with dry rot and no obvious source of moisture. The micilliem will travel through brickwork to find any source of water.
That said Joe is also right or very nearly. There is a very very small chance that rot will set in, in truth the timbers weren't wet for long and simply drying them out is fine and treatment needs only to be put on if you really want complete piece of mind.
When I started work in the 80's we took a rather more aggressive approach to dry rot, it was all removed bricks removed until there was no more signs of milicilium and then further , plus all the joints were raked out, then sprayed and bricks soaked before being put in. Nowadays people like the National Trust don't like the use of chemicals and just rely on eliminating the source of damp.

when i 1st started doing it,we used to burn the fibres off the brickwork with a large blow touch,can you imagine the health and safety implications now

 

[dave134]

Just let them dry. There is no chance of dry rot up there and there's no more chance of woodworm than there was before.

really?

i have ripped out quite a few properties where dry rot(worse case scenario here dave)has taken hold from a leak.on the 1st floor.
didnt know that dry rot new the rules of not starting above ground floor.
so do you give it a good telling off if it goes any higher then ground floor?

like any rot the conditions have to spot on for it to establish itself.
personally dave it will do you no harm in spraying,as said before peace of mind.
agree with the woodworm though

Many thanks for all the really useful repliies. I think if I just spray the joists with woodworm treatment/preserver I can't do no harm. Thanks again.

 

[JohnD]

Long-term damp, including from a dripping pipe, is likely to encourage rot and worm. However, a burst pipe is much less likely to cause it, because you get a sudden drenching with clean, chlorinated water, which is either very cold, or very hot, neither of which encourage growth, after which your ceiling might fall down and you repair the burst, so it dries out quickly and you do not have a long-term damp condition.

After a burst it is best to lift the flooring and a few boards to get plenty of fresh cold air in to dry it out. But if the ceiling falls down that will usually give ventilation except perhaps between joists beyond the open area.

Incidentally, I like to use Cuprinol Green under bathroom and kitchen floors, as you never know when there might be an undetected leak in the future.

 

[big-all]

the chances off damage after 1 week i would estimate at between 0 and 0.5 percent

soaking wet timber wont easily rot nor will damp timber it needs to be around 20%+ moisture content before any dammage will occur and the moisture content needs to be fairly constant for mould and rot to develop

 

[dave134]

After the ceilings came down I also took down the laths (someone said I could have overboarded on those but I decided to remove them) and left the ceilings completely open to dry out.

The thing is, underneath some of the floor boards, and on some of the joists, there's like a whiteish colour I thought that might be the start of some fungus growth. Is that possible?