Rant: Subfloor squeak chase on a remodel took 4 hours and a chalk line

Last week I spent an afternoon on a 1970s ranch in Des Moines, drove screws through 3/4 plywood and still had a squeak, so I snapped a chalk line across the joists and found the real culprit was a loose blocking piece that someone face-nailed at a 45, has anyone else wasted a morning on a squeak that turned out to be something totally dumb like that?

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oliver_fisher22d ago

Chasing a squeak through a whole subfloor only to find a scrap of 2x4 doing its own thing is the classic remodel tax. Last one I had was a joist hanger nail that had backed out a quarter inch and was just rubbing on the plumbing pipe above it. Could not hear it from below, could not hear it from above, only when the cat walked across the bedroom at 3am. Swear half the houses in the Midwest are held together with spite and a few angled nails that missed their mark. Chalk line is smart, though. I usually end up crawling around like an idiot listening for the creak until my knees give out, then I find the thing by accident while looking for something else.