Rossmann Group Looking For A New Shop

[Nusa]

Yeah, the TLDR is that the contractor was a rip-off artist and virtually everything the guy did is substandard and has to be ripped out. Louis is too far down the list of people the contractor owes to expect any money back even if he did bother suing, so the money is gone and Louis got burned. Louis's new plan is to give up on his dream of level floors and just fix the existing floors and other essentials so he can move in.

Louis has longer videos on the subject up, but this is the one to watch if you want the short version. The actual firing over the phone conversation starts about 4 minutes in.

[Lord of nothing]

I guessed the never heard of: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire_loading

I haven't been keeping up to date, what's the TLDR?

Well I was wondering why the use a Wooden Floor Construction. In my eyes thats a HUGE fire hazard. Lets say a Cheap Chinese Power Supply on the Floor Catch Fire and ash fall truth and the structure below glows until the Fire break wild.

And yet I can assure you to this day, in Austria, houses are made with both wood and electricity..

And the Burn constantly down... A House Made of Bricks, Congregate would just one Room be burned Down.

we visited a friend in Calabria

Build by the Mafia...

What material would you suggest they use?

In our House and former Shop we used different Materials: Ceramic Tile, Industrial Carpet, PVC ("Linoleum"),...

Here I found some from a German Company: https://www.lindner-group.com/de_DE/ausbauprodukte/boden/hohlboden/cavopex/
The use "Tiles" out of Cement other Company use Similar "Tiles" out of Not burnable Materials. Here no idiot would do this out of Wood!

What I forgott to mention a House who use Wood use a lot of Materials who are not Burn like "Dry Wall plates", Glass Wool Insulation,...

[Monkeh]

In my eyes thats a HUGE fire hazard.

Thankfully, people who actually know what they're talking about make these sorts of decisions..

[mariush]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

Can't use concrete because there's not enough pillars / support beams / whatever they're called in the cellar - the weight of concrete or other materials that would make the floor flat PLUS what you'd have on top (desks, equipment) would be too much and cause the floor to break and you'd end up in the basement.

Yeah, he got screwed out of 20-30k ... about the same as he gets through gofundme campaign, so it's not like he ends up bankrupt or anything, it's just a significant loss.

The floor as is now could work for a few years, but it's built wrong and it would eventually get worse. Also, he would have to hire some other companies to fix the bathroom (because floor was raised the bathroom would also have to be raised) and the front of the store also has to be done ... it's a lot of added costs.
So I guess he decided to just take out the bad floor and accept the loss and just put some tile on the floor and move sooner into the new store.

[EEVblog]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

Can't he just get a concrete dude in to flatten it out?

[langwadt]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

Can't he just get a concrete dude in to flatten it out?

apparently the structure can't carry that much extra load

[Lord of nothing]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

WE TE EF?! And the Rent this "Shit Hole"? 
Here in Austria I would call the Authorities first to inspect it if is safe to Use.
Its not normal that the Floor bend! 

[MasterBuilder]

Floor levelling options:

1. Raise the low part. Pour a screed if there a big drop like 1", less than that a floor levelling compound may be used. These options need a lot of material which would indeed weigh a lot.

2. Lower the high part. A diamond wheel on a grinder will do this hard messy work. But 2/3" is probably excessive.

3. Build a wooden floor over the existing unlevel subfloor. Seems the best option for this considering the weight issues. This should be no problem to a reputable contractor.

[Nusa]

#1 too heavy
#2 likely not practical. This isn't on a slab, there's a basement under. I don't know the underlying structure, but it's a NYC building over 100 years old, so imagine.
#3 was what he was having done when he got burned by the contractor. He's now too short on cash and time to risk trying that again.

Remember, he's paying rent on two stores the longer this process takes. So moving is now becoming important than making everything perfect.

Louis didn't start this thread and is not likely to read it. If you have genuine useful suggestions after actually looking at his youtube videos of the store, contact him directly. If you ask how to contact him, then I instantly know you skipped looking at his videos.

[Lord of nothing]

Remember, he's paying rent on two stores the longer this process takes.

Sorry how insane someone must be to Rent that?
Ok ok back when my Dads "Company" was looking for a affordable Shop we did make a Deal with the Owner of the Building that he is paying for new Window, Door and Floor and we Paint the Wall our Self and make the IT, Phone and other Wire our self.
That was far from then what Mr. Rossmann should do.

[EEVblog]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

Can't he just get a concrete dude in to flatten it out?

apparently the structure can't carry that much extra load

Then how about just flattening out a centre strip and have a small flat step either side?
If it's even enough you could even get wooden pieces custom angle cut either side maybe?
Surely there is an easy solution for something like this, it's only a few inches

[Brumby]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

Can't he just get a concrete dude in to flatten it out?

apparently the structure can't carry that much extra load

Then how about just flattening out a centre strip and have a small flat step either side?
If it's even enough you could even get wooden pieces custom angle cut either side maybe?
Surely there is an easy solution for something like this, it's only a few inches

IIRC, the difference at some points was much greater - something like 6", I believe.

There solution implemented by the contractor was on the right track ... with one exception and one cheap-out switch.

The exception was the means for support of the framing.  There should have been shims or packers under the framing timber.  Instead, there were pieces nailed to the side - which had a time advantage against fitting packers.  These pieces relied on the shear rigidity of nails - which, under the forces you would expect on a floor, would soon give, allowing the surface to droop under load (bouncy floor) and/or enable creaking.  Packers under the frame would be under compression and would not budge, especially if a bead of a construction adhesive was applied.  If the boards could be lifted, these packers could still be fitted and the floor salvaged - but it seems lifting the boards is problematic.

The cheap-out was the change to OSB.  I cringed when Louis and Paul let that one slide.

[sokoloff]

Sometimes moving or adding a wall in a building is done yet leaving the sprinkler heads in their old position because contractors are lazy crooks.

Or perhaps more commonly, because a property user hires a contractor to move a wall and doesn’t hire one to update the sprinkler system.

Sure, there are crooks in contracting, but there’s almost surely a lot more (in absolute numbers) tight with a buck property owner/users than crooked contractors.

[Nominal Animal]

A few years ago, I redid the floor on my parent's kitchen, in the middle floor of a three-story house, with a wood-structure floor.  The floor was creaking, and had sagged an inch or so from a very heavy brick bread oven.  The structure was two layers of two-by-six joists (crossways).  To fix most of the sag, I added shims between the two layers, at regular intervals; about half a foot to foot apart.

When the house was built over thirty years ago, the floor was made of two layers of floor-quality OSB.  (It's over an inch thick, with a long tongue on two sides, and a deep groove on two sides.)  Some of it was glued, but all nailed with "floor nails" (friction-adding "collars" near the head), and it was the nails creaked like crazy, at every step.  After removing the OSB, shimming, and replacing with new OSB with screws, no glue, the floor is silent now, and has been for five years.  (I would have preferred plywood, but the price difference was too high.)

At Louis' new store, to get a flat floor with two layers of small joists (two-by-twos at two foot spacing, shims would be needed between the lower joist and the concrete floor, at most a foot intervals.  The shims are often wood, so they really are just short pieces of boards of different thicknesses.

It is not hard to do, if I can do it.

A couple of laser levels (that cost less than a hundred bucks) correctly positioned, and a couple of guys can shim the structure flat and level in no time, before the joists are screwed together, then a layer of plywood glued and screwed on to, optionally a second layer glued and screwed on top (to tie large sections of the floor to a single slab -- but note that if the underworks need fixing, the entire slab needs to be replaced), depending on the thickness of the plywood.

I am not at all surprised by the comments in the video from people who do that sort of stuff for a living, cursing the contractor to hell.
Sure, there are a lot of contractors with shoe size similar to their IQ doing floor work too, but for an average person, it isn't hard.  For someone who has talent in organizing and doing that sort of stuff, it should have been a cakewalk: a straightforward job that if well done, would have gained a LOT of positive publicity.  Perfect for any honest capable contractor, really.

[TassiloH]

#1 too heavy

Not necessarily. There is bonded floor filling that is basically styrofoam particles with a cement-based binding agent. That stuff is good from 0.5inch to 10s of inches and does not weigh much. On top of that go pre-made flooring elements, and then the final floor (e.g. https://www.fermacell.com/en/flooring but there are other companies, too). I have used it once for a remodeling, this is relatively easy and quite fast. Especially with a big rectangular room. No clue if something like that is available in the US, though.

[langwadt]

Basically the floor is not flat, it's something like 2-3" height difference between the middle of the floor and the sides

Can't he just get a concrete dude in to flatten it out?

apparently the structure can't carry that much extra load

Then how about just flattening out a centre strip and have a small flat step either side?
If it's even enough you could even get wooden pieces custom angle cut either side maybe?
Surely there is an easy solution for something like this, it's only a few inches

IIRC, the difference at some points was much greater - something like 6", I believe.

There solution implemented by the contractor was on the right track ... with one exception and one cheap-out switch.

The exception was the means for support of the framing.  There should have been shims or packers under the framing timber.  Instead, there were pieces nailed to the side - which had a time advantage against fitting packers.  These pieces relied on the shear rigidity of nails - which, under the forces you would expect on a floor, would soon give, allowing the surface to droop under load (bouncy floor) and/or enable creaking.  Packers under the frame would be under compression and would not budge, especially if a bead of a construction adhesive was applied.  If the boards could be lifted, these packers could still be fitted and the floor salvaged - but it seems lifting the boards is problematic.

you can even buy ready-to-go plastic support systems with interlocking wedges or a screw system to adjust the heights

https://youtu.be/iF0Ns58sfV4

[Bud]

Yeah...., Day 38....
Did you guys watch the other 37 days videos? Rossman seems to shoot and upload every possible shit that often lasts hour, is that in attempt of collect as much youtube money as the sheep crowd can give. Why don't he publish his toilet visit videos, i am sure many of his fans will be excited to watch.

[Nominal Animal]

Yeah...., Day 38....
Did you guys watch the other 37 days videos? Rossman seems to shoot and upload every possible shit that often lasts hour

Not if you only watch the edited stuff here.