flooringrepair
We've noticed some cut in half floorboards, underneath old carpet looking to see if it is possible to repair these cuts with some way. Or does the entire floorboard need replacing?
We can't put on new carpet until these are fixed, we noticed dents/rips in carpets previously because the flooring bends close to the cuts in the wood.
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You can pull carpet up off the tacking strip to do some work. It depends on how much of the carpet you're going to pull up. Carpet is stretched over tack strips using a kick stretcher or a power stretcher so if you pull the WHOLE carpet it you risk losing that stretch. I did some work under our carpet and wound up pulling up too much and had to hire a company to come out and re-stretch and tack it back down but if you're just pulling up a small corner you should be ok to just push it back down.
(Word of warning: when pushing the carpet back down on the tack strip, use a board to push it down, the tacks on the strip routinely go through the carpet and it hurts like all get out if it suddenly jams into your fingertip)
If the work is in the middle of the floor I've used a utility knife and made a lengthy slit in the carpet to do what I needed to and then called out a carpet install company to re-seal the carpet with a glue strip. After he re-glued the carpet and ran the seam blending tool over it it looked perfect. I would highly advise against nailing through the carpet, it creates an indent and doesn't look very good.
You took the wind out of my sails with that last paragraph. I was going to suggest using a nut/bolt.
As far as it causing problems when the tabletop is lowered, you can recess the bolt head. Yeah, you could make the cavity in which the bolt will stay on the underside of the tabletop, but maybe you'll drill too far or crack/scratch the tabletop if you chisel it out. It could end badly... which is why you should instead house the bolt head on the top-side of the cross member.
Brown = table top
Black = underlying cross member
The one on the left is what you were talking about. The one on the right is what you want to do.
Also, use a washer under the bolt head, etc.
Best Answer
It's normal for floorboards to have cuts in them as getting boards long enough for the entire span is impractical or would be more costly. Shorter boards are commonly used so you will have joints.
However, the joints are normally level and both sides of the board should be supported. A joint should only be made on top of a joist so that both sides are properly supported. In your case it seems like the top half doesn't have the proper support. Perhaps the joint missed the underlying joist and the builder was too lazy to fix it properly or maybe some extra bracing has come loose.
The fix is going to be to remove the board on top and add some bracing underneath it. It should be pretty straightforward to screw a block of bracing to the nearby joist. If the joist is more than 1" away, you may just want to remove the top and bottom board and trim them properly do the joint is centered on the joist or replace the boards if trimming them would make them too short.