Hot take: trying to level a 100 year old floor with self-leveler took me an entire weekend and a whole new bag of mix after the first pour just pooled in one corner.

Has anyone else had a floor that fought back this hard, and what did you end up doing instead?

2 comments

2 Comments

Honestly that sounds like a user error more than a floor problem! Self-leveler is supposed to be foolproof if you prep the area right and mix it correctly. Maybe the floor wasn't cleaned properly or the primer was skipped. Sometimes the old house just needs a more careful touch, not a different method. Giving up after one tough weekend seems premature when the product works for thousands of people.

sarahh481mo ago

Did you check if that old floor was actually flat to begin with or just level? People mix up those two things all the time with self-leveler... a hundred year old floor can look level but be all kinds of wavy underneath. The bigger issue nobody's talking about is that old houses settle in weird ways, and sometimes the joists are sagging or the subfloor is rotted in spots. You might have been fighting a lost cause because the floor structure itself needs sistering or shimming before you even think about pouring anything on top of it. That pooled corner tells me there's probably a dip or a crown in the framing that no amount of leveler is gonna fix without building up the low spots first.