How Do I Find Floor Joists

Joists are typically run perpendicular to beams and they connect with the supportive framework of the structure to reinforce it.

How do i find floor joists. The nails tell you where the first joist is and which. Floor joists on new construction. Use a design value table to find the fb value for your floor joists. Look for a stamp on the joist that indicates the lumber s species and grade.

If this is the first floor of a house then you can see the subfloor from underneath in the basement. The joists span across a room or other area are supported on their ends and sometimes in their middles by load bearing walls or beams. 1 grade 2 by 6 douglas fir larch joists spaced 16 inches on center. Dead load and live load.

Dead load for residential construction is generally considered to be about 10 pounds per square foot. Use the tape measure to map the rough location of the next joist roughly 16 or 24 inches. Extend the tape measure out 24 inches if you did not find a joist 16 inches from the wall ceiling corner. Their spacing is critical to engineering safety and they must be perfectly flat and level or the floor will be uneven.

Employ a stud finder to find a joist. Look closely at the carpet near the yellow tape measure. Look at the subfloor and find a row of nails which are attached to a joist. As an example consider a room with a floor area of 10 feet by 11 feet 2 inches built with no.

Joist span is also governed by the weight placed on the floor. Pull back the corner of the carpet padding with the pliers. Kneel down on the hardwood floor and gently tap the head of the hammer on it paying special attention to the sound it makes. You can guesstimate where the joist is shoot a screw on either side go underneath and measure where the joist is between the screws go back up and use the measurement to hit it.

Turn the stud finder on. It is very important to install floor joists properly. A number of test hole locations are within the photo but they are not visible. Most people use a stud finder to locate studs through drywall but the same principle applies when looking for a joist in the floor.

The joists in this part of the house run at a right angle to the yellow measure tape which is consistent with the direction they run in the closet on the other side of the house. Move the hammer to the left or the right until the sound changes from hollow to solid.