Baseboard Shifting Issues

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Exosoldier22

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May 14, 2019
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Thomaston Maine
Hello,

Just bought my first home! The list grows! Anyway I have this baseboard that's been bugging me since we moved in. As far as I can tell the main board is original to the home (1830's) with the trim added later on. From the picture you can tell that the baseboard has shifted quite a bit ( and yes I know this most likely is attributed to the home being built in the 1800's and it shifting) aside from ripping out the entire board and ressetting is there anything I can do to remedy this on a budget. The previous owners just tacked on molding that doesn't even look close to the other, more worried about the uneven joints,am I better to just reset with a 12ft board to get around the gapping?
j0z96e.jpg

j0z96e.jpg
 
It all depends on how much you want to keep the authenticity of the old house. If you're trying to preserve it, then you might have to make your own molding to match the original. Since it is painted ( and if you plan on keeping it painted) you can build it in pieces by adding trim on trim and doing the touch-ups with caulk.
Of course, you can replace it with new and move on to the next project
 
Not a total old home purist and wouldn't mind replacing the trim, but the separation is probably part of a bigger issue that I should be concerned about?
 
I'm not seeing shifting or settling, I'm seeing two different size base boards and two different profile trim pieces. If you want it to look the same, I'd suggest removing the old trim and replacing with all same edging trim.
 
Some one said we don't know what we don't know. It looks like the trim on the left was original and a wall or something was removed. If this is an addition from years ago that little movement would be minimal and then we don't know how dry the trim was when added and what warping pressure it has applied to it in acclimating to the house.
It is not pretty but it is not a structural problem.
 
Thank you all for your input! You can't really tell from the photo but the trim on the left is actually about a 1/8" off the flooring, as you keep moving down it actually is flush with the floor.
 
All we can see in the pic is trim. If there are other issues in the same area, you would have to provide more pics, including a wide shot so we can see what we can see.
 
Can you take a good resolution photo from further back so we can see the whole picture? It’s hard to develop a solution with such a small representation of the total problem.

Baseboard is not usually fastened to the wall very well. A few finishing nails and a coat of paint hold it down. You could try running a knife along the paint edge to break the seal and see if you can push the baseboard back down flush with the other, then fasten it back into position with some long finishing nails into a stud or the sill plate at the bottom of the wall. If there is glue behind it then you are probably not going to budge it that way and you could chalk it up to being a bad install.

After all that work, if you can’t find a matching top trim piece then it will always look out of place and would make all the above work pointless.
 
The gap at the floor is why we use a shoe molding that can bend a little to fit the normal ups and downs of the floor.
 
It doesn't look like a shifting issue, it looks like two different sizes of baseboards. They tried to replicate custom molding or molding they couldn't find with stuff they were able to find at the home center.
 
I don't see any shifting either, just badly mis-matched baseboard. You should replace the stuff on the right -- it looks pretty bad. Lower board looks like plywood.
From the photos, it rather looks like the old baseboard was made of three pieces -- first a simple 1x board, then a piece of half round molding above it, and a somewhat smaller piece of half round above that. Not sure how handy you are, but does not look too hard to replicate. I would probably use my oscillating tool on the end of the old molding to get a clean edge.
 
Your wider picture has the floor covered with a mat. The close up doesn't really show any difference in the floor. Can you post a picture with the floor exposed?
 
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