Leveling, floors, walls you name it

[Robert Patterson]

A forum for mobile home repair? Who'd a thought it . Hello folks! I'm new to this forum and have alot of questions. First off I'm new to mobile home living. My family and I had a house up till just a few months ago. With the economy and all we decided to get rid of the house and move into the mobile home. I have a total of 15. 14 are rentals and we live in a 28 x 80. I sorta inherited them from my folks. Anyways we decided we would remodel. "Holy Mackerel" . We uncovered some bad stuff.
We pulled up all the carpet in living room and dining area. What a mess. Looked under the kitchen sink and dishwasher. The floor was all but gone. So I thought OK no big deal. Pulled out all the kitchen cabinets, needless to say they just fell apart. Started replacing flooring in living room and kitchen. Realized that the floor had a peak right in the middle where the 2 halves come together. That's when I knew we had some real problems. Ask my dad if he had ever had the house leveled. Nope, not since it was set up. 26 yrs ago. Called a couple different mobile home repair people and got quotes from $1000 to $1500 to re level. Ended up my dad knew someone. They came in and leveled the place for $300.
Here's the problem. The floors are still way off level. So bad I can't install cabinets. It would take about an inch and half of shimming. Not good. We have plans of putting laminate flooring and you can see the slope in the floor. It's the worst about 3 ft. from the kitchen walls. The is an attached covered porch on the back of the house where the kitchen is. That's what I believe has pulled the wall/floors down. HOW DO I FIX IT?? Can it be fixed to within reason. Can I jack up the porch? Its tied into the roof by the way. I can fix floors, walls ect. But this I'm not so sure of. Please someone. I need help here.
Sorry for the rambling but my wife is about ready to pull my hair out .
Thanks folks

[Greg]

Hi & welcome. My first thought is that the home is still out of level. What did they use to level it? A water level is the only way to make sure it is level, even a 8' level is no where near accurate over an 80' span.
Mark (the site owner) has written a book that covers about every aspect of mobile home repair, avalable in the 'Books & parts" section of the site. Greg

[JD]

Even if the workers did an excellent job leveling the mobile home, there could still be a huge difference in level from the I beam area to the rim joist. This would be the fault of the floor, not the leveling. The porch could definitely case this to happen. So can adding weight to the walls and/or roof.

I would certainly add piers of some sort to the porch next to the home and disconnect the porch/deck from the home. As for fixing a curved or bent floor, I don't know of an effective way of doing this. Trying to jack up the wall to unbend things will not work. That only lifts the home off of the piers. That is unless this is a dry rot problem in the floor framing, in which case jacking up the wall could be disastrous. Trying to fake out the floor with leveling compounds might work, but this can lead to other problems along that wall, especially if there is a door on it. I have worked this problem several times and have always resorted to shimming and creative trim. As a contractor, there are usually cost restrictions on how much I can do. On a floor similar to yours, I actually nailed down a wide strip of 3/4" plywood along the wall just to start the shimming process. It was not 1 1/2" out though.

JMO
JD

[Robert Patterson]

Even if the workers did an excellent job leveling the mobile home, there could still be a huge difference in level from the I beam area to the rim joist. This would be the fault of the floor, not the leveling. The porch could definitely case this to happen. So can adding weight to the walls and/or roof.

I would certainly add piers of some sort to the porch next to the home and disconnect the porch/deck from the home. As for fixing a curved or bent floor, I don't know of an effective way of doing this. Trying to jack up the wall to unbend things will not work. That only lifts the home off of the piers. That is unless this is a dry rot problem in the floor framing, in which case jacking up the wall could be disastrous. Trying to fake out the floor with leveling compounds might work, but this can lead to other problems along that wall, especially if there is a door on it. I have worked this problem several times and have always resorted to shimming and creative trim. As a contractor, there are usually cost restrictions on how much I can do. On a floor similar to yours, I actually nailed down a wide strip of 3/4" plywood along the wall just to start the shimming process. It was not 1 1/2" out though.

JMO
JD

Hi JD,
Thanks for the replies. OK let me see if I can explain this. The back side of the house seems to be worse than the front. By taking a level (only a 3') and laying it on the floor starting where the 2 halves meet in a 3 ft. length it is approx. 1/4 in. low going toward the back wall and continues to get worse from there. I do know that when they leveled the house they did not jack up or mess with the back porch at all. I have been under the house and all the wood appears to be in good shape. Being the porch roof is tied in with the roof of the house disconnecting it from the house doesn't seem to be an option. At least to me. That's why I'm wondering if the porch is jacked up with the house if that would be of any help. I'm thinking that being they did not mess with the porch that may be the culprit. What you think? I appreciate all input. By the way it is only about 1 inch not an 1 1/2.

Thanks,
Robert

[oldfart]

Robert as much as it pains me to say this..some problems yer just gonn'a have to work around. You mentioned having the home re-leveled...good for you..that's a great place to start. But since the home has been there for 26yrs. there's some things that you won't change by leveling. You've already noticed that after the leveling there's a "crown" in the floor. The outside walls have sagged a bit and the floor has bowed up. Robert..yer not gonn'a change that. Yup..you can raise the outside walls...that'd probably crack every seam in the house and rip the roof apart. And the floor will still be bowed up in the middle. The floor-joists have "taken a set" after all these years and you'll not fix this problem by doing so. You've got 2 choices to make..learn to live with it and work around the problem or sell the home. Laminate flooring probably will never work. You can't make the floor flat enough for it to work. Yup..you can shim out the outside edge of the floor....(how much??) lay down new sub-flooring after gutting all the old sub-floor and go from there. Or you can use vinyl flooring and avoid the cost and frustration and get on with hanging new cabinets. Hmmmm..more thoughts to come my new friend. Audie..the longwinded Oldfart..

[oldfart]

Robert when it comes to installing new base-cabinets don't look at the bowed floor. The base-cabinets attach to the walls and yes...here and there they won't touch the floor. So what? They sell trim to cover up the gaps between the bottom of the cabinets and the floor..eh? It's simple baseboard trim. It comes in oak, pine,maple, and vinyl. It comes plain, beaded, painted, unpainted and even (in my case) plain 1x2/1x3/1x4 boards. Shims can be tucked under the base-cabinets to distribute the weight if that is an issue. The base-board will cover that up as well. For the upper-cabinets....same thing. My ceiling bows down 1 7/8in. from the outside walls to the middle of the kitchen. I hung the new upper-cabinets and filled in the gaps (between the top of the cabinets and the ceiling) with trim boards. In most cases a 1 1/2in. cove trim piece worked right-smart well. On the sides a 3/4in. piece of trim did the job. Now, mind ye..it ain't perfect..and it ain't done yet. It's a work in progress. But I ain't payin' no mortgage! Audie..the Oldfart...

[Jim from Canada]

Ya, a water level is the way to go. I bought a Stanley electronic water level and an extra 50' of tubing that slips over the stock tubing. Works wonders, just keep raising the end of the tube until you hear the beep at the other end with the reference level. Continuous beep, you've gone too far. Easy!

Jim

[Robert Patterson]

Was talkin with my Dad and he doesn't think the guy that did the leveling did use a water level. He thinks he used a long standard level. Going to either have someone else check it, making sure they use a water level or buy Mark's book and a WL and do it myself. Not sure about how to raise the porch and the house. I'm fairly convinced the house is not leveled properly.

[Yanita]

Hi,

I am with JD on this one. The porch being directly attached to your home is what is giving you the trouble, and unless it is removed will probably always give you trouble.

I checked for a profile and did not find one. If you live in a cold weather area and the porch and home are not on the same foundation even more damage will result.

In our BOOKS/PARTS link we also have a manual about Mobile Home Additions/Porches. I think this would be very beneficial for you.

I noticed in your original post you said you have a doublewide. If you should attempt this relevel yourself be very careful and get all the knowledge, tools and help you will need.

Concealing the shimming inside is one thing, but you really should invest in removing the porch from the home and making it a free standing porch. This is generally code in most areas.

If the porch is pulling your home down on that side then it is only a matter of time and something is going to snap, like your exterior wall studs, major roof damage, broken sill plate...

JMO, and good luck,

Yanita

[Robert Patterson]

The house is on private property, 15 acres. Well actually 7 1/2. There are 14 MH's on the other 7 1/2 acres. We live in North Texas and we have no code. County roads and all. Disconnecting the porches would be a major endeavor. Roof is also tied in. When the porches were built they didn't realize they shouldn't be built to the house. Both front and back porches are connected. Man this is turning into a drag. I will get a profile done up.

[Robert Patterson]

Well if I could figure out how to creat a profile I would. Can't seem to figure out how to. Where do I go to creat or edit my profile?

[JD]

Hi Robert,

Sent you a PM, (Private Message) about the profile space.

I think you are right to get someone else to level the home or learn how to do it yourself, if that is your kind of thing. I have been doing this work for over 20 years and it still isn't my kind of thing . If the other guys did not use a water level, they would not be able to do an accurate job of leveling the home, except by luck. On a double wide, you could have 40 to 60+ piers. (5' o.c.) That would be a lot of luck.

Be sure your of next guy's level of experience and hopefully get references. This is usually not an expensive job, but it is very important to your home that is is done right. Might be better to leave it alone than do it wrong. Then let him know your concerns about the deck and the hump in the floor. If the deck is not on piers that can be adjusted, like the home is, the home would need to be leveled to the deck. This is a bad scenario as the deck may not be level to itself. Again, separating the deck from the home is the thing to do, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

JD

[Robert Patterson]

Thanks JD! Got it. Won't say it's my kinda thing but I don't mind getting dirty. I have access to 50 ton bottle jacks and tools. Got to order Marks book and see if I can make heads or tails of it.

[Robert Patterson]

Ok I have a guy coming out next week to level the house. He says he can make it much better than it is. Probably not perfect but close. Will update everybody when it is done

[Robert Patterson]

Hope everyone had a good turkey day. Had the house re-leveled. Was much worse then I could of dreamed. Had to raise the house a total of 5 1/2 ins. on the length and approx. 2" on the width. One wall at the back sliding door cracked and found out that one of the floor headers (not sure if that is the correct terminology) has either been eaten up by termites or rotted from water damage. Right where the wall cracked. About 12 - 15 ft. has to be replaced and then raised with the rest of the house. The worst of it is now I have to replace more than 100ft. of the insulated skirting that I just had installed. At the tune of $3000 bucks. This is an R-19 insulation that has about a 16 gauge sheet metal on both sides. When it was installed we could immediately tell the difference. The heater doesn't have to run near as much. Biggest problem is I can't afford to have the people come out and replace it. SO if anyone knows where I can purchase it and the correct name of it is that would be very helpful. If I can find it I will replace it myself. Some of it is raised off the ground 5 or 6" which totally defeats the purpose of it. It is critter proof. They would have to dig under the track the insulation sits in. Any info would be very helpful.

Thanks