What to do when new wooden floor warps

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ClodaghK

Registered User
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About a month ago I employed a carpenter to lay 110m solid oak flooring down onto a concrete floor that has underfloor heating underneath. It was put down using elastilon.

However when I visited the house today, every bedroom that the wooden floor had been laid in, had warped. The unusual thing is that they have all warped in the same place - where the wooden floor meets the tiled floor of the hall. And it has warped considerably. You can hear the strain on the floor when you try to stand on it to even it out.

I was just wondering what the immediate solution for this is? Is it advisable to take a couple of boards up myself to take the strain off the floor until I can get the carpenter back, or am I best leaving it all alone.

Just to note, the flooring was in the house for 2 weeks before it was laid and the heating was on for a month at 16 degrees. Moisture readings were also carried out and these were normal.

Many thanks
 
In my view there is nothing unexpected here. It is not a good idea to use solid timber with underfloor heating - who recommended to you that you should?

With uf heating the timber will be pushed to its limits and therefore it is necessary to use a good quality semi-soild board where the layers under the solid oak are good quality timber and are glued in the opposite direction to the grain of the flooring. This restricts the lateral movement of the oak

Sorry to have nothing positive to offer but this is my experience.

Best bet is to get your chippie to fix the prob now and hope that the narrow width of the boards means that you may not get a recurrence

Good luck
 
ya it is the floor that i spoke of previously. now all the floors have been affected.
 
badge55 said:
In my view there is nothing unexpected here. It is not a good idea to use solid timber with underfloor heating - ...
Click to expand...
In fairness to ClodaghK and her carpenter, Elastilon is specifically designed for use with solid, semi-solid and laminate over UFH.

With the recent damp weather and the heating off (?) it is likely the boards esxpanded and insufficient expansion gaps were left, leading to buckilng.

The recommendation when using elastilon, is that only the ends of boards are glued to allow them to "float" freely against each other along their length.

You need to get your carpenter back ASAP, IMO.
 
mathepac said:
In fairness to ClodaghK and her carpenter, Elastilon is specifically designed for use with solid, semi-solid and laminate over UFH.
Click to expand...

You are correct Mathepac but that does not change the fact that solid boards move ( expand / contract ) more than good quality semi solid.

Elastillon will not want to exclude themselves from the entire solid board market and in many cases the product will work fine.

However I still do not recommend solid boards with uf heating - simply put you are taking more of a risk that you may have a problem.

For general information it is definitely not a good idea to use very wide solid boards with uf heating as the wider they are the more movement you will get.
 

Generally agree with all stated here.
I preume it was Elastilon STRONG which was used with the UF heating and not just Elastilon BASIC.
Elastilon obviously don't want to be discounted from the solid wood floor business but they do stand over their product (in my experience).

Personally I would have gone with an Engineered floor when laying on UF heating but a good quality semi-solid would also be perfect as stated earlier.
 
Just to clarify a few things

*The boards are 110m wide
*The heating was on for a consideable time before the boards were laid and was at 16 degrees (as recommended) by the Elastilon website
*None of the floor was glued. It is just stuck to the Elastion which floats on the concrete. The joints of the wood were just slotted together.
*And it was Elastilon basic that was used - didnt know there was different types

I have been in contact with the carpenter and he believes that the floor will settle if I "open a couple of windows" - i am not so sure. The floor has warped so badly, that even if you attempt to stand on the raised part of the floor it does not go back down.

A friend of a friend suggested cutting down the boards around the edge of the room by a half an inch to allow the floor to settle - could be possible as no skirtings have been laid as yet.

Does anyone think this would be a viable solution
 
Perhaps you should get a different carpenter to sort the problem out as your original carpenter seems unwilling to do so. Are there any extra boards left over from the job as the warped boards might need to be completely replaced.
 
ClodaghK said:
...*The boards are 110m wide...
Click to expand...
I think you mean 11.0 cm (approx. 4.3 ins)?
ClodaghK said:
...*The heating was on for a consideable time before the boards were laid and was at 16 degrees (as recommended) by the Elastilon website...
Click to expand...
But now the heating is off (and the boards have absorbed moisture from the colder, damper atmosphere)?
ClodaghK said:
...*None of the floor was glued. It is just stuck to the Elastion which floats on the concrete. The joints of the wood were just slotted together. ...
Click to expand...
The instructions on the Elastilon website recommend gluing the ends of the boards together. They also recommend an overlapping polythene vapour barrier on the concrete underneath the Elastilon first.
ClodaghK said:
...*And it was Elastilon basic that was used - didnt know there was different types...
Click to expand...
The type to be used depends on the type of floor - solid, semi, laminate
I don't believe that will solve the problem, in fact it may make it worse.
ClodaghK said:
...A friend of a friend suggested cutting down the boards around the edge of the room by a half an inch to allow the floor to settle - could be possible as no skirtings have been laid as yet.

Does anyone think this would be a viable solution
Click to expand...
Does that mean that edges and ends of the boards are butted up tight against the walls?

If so, this is the crux of the problem in that the boards have no gap to expand into as they flex.

Depending on the type of flooring and board dimensions, there must be a gap all round between the finished floor and the walls of between 1 to maybe 3 cm.

It may not be possible to cut the boards without cutting the Elastilon as they are now stuck together, IMHO.

I suggest you check all these details and then meet with your carpenter as only he can provide a solution at this stage.
 
From what I have read of your previous posts is this was your carpenters first time using Elastilon.

Is it possible he has no experience of putting down wood floors?

I have seen experienced carpenters make a pigs ear of floors in the past.

Everything I have read from your posts suggests to me for you to call your carpenter and tell him to cut around the edge of the floor to create expansion room for your floor.

If the floor is bouncing at the edges then this would be the solution.

SLF
 
Many thanks for all your responses.

As the floor is jammed up against every wall now, I think the only solution is to cut the floor all around the edges to allow it to expand.

The heating has never been turned off and as I am not living in the house yet, the windows are rarely opened, so you would hope, that if the floor was cut it would settle down and would not buckle again. (due to the air temperature being kept rather constant)

Just in response to a previous post, the vapour barrier was put down between the concrete and the elastilon, and a gap was left around the edges - however it is now apparent that this gap was not enough. - only reasoning that i can come to of why it happened in the first place

In hindsight, I am not so sure about using wooden flooring with underfloor heating full stop or at least using it with Elastilon. It has a mind of its own, and to be honest is nearly more trouble than its worth!!!! I used tiles in the rest of the house - and what a dream compared to the wood. Alot to be said for putting tiles all over the house, and then using rugs were needs be. I know to a certain extent, this defeats the heating coming through the floor, but for the piece of mind that the floor isnt going to buckle a couple of weeks after laying it, I think its worth it.

Thanks again
 
get the carpenter back in or else threaten him with a solicitors letter. any carpenter that dosent leave enough gaps for the floor to expand hasnt a clue what he is doing. when he says open a few windows, the room will cool down and the floor will contract again, what about when the windows are closed and the room heats up again?? if the room isnt there for the timber to expand its goign to happen every time. i have absolutely no problem with my timber floors whereas a friend of mine has had warping all over the place. get him back, end of story
 
For UFH or floating - mainly semi solids. Solids like to be nailed to at least 3/4" WBP fixed to concrete. 1/2" gap is recomended in both cases.

By any chance you didn't do your floors first and the tiles after, giving a nice moisture ant heat?
 
No, the wooden floors were the last thing to be laid. The tiling and painting was finished a week before the flooring started and a dehumidifier was bought in for that week to really try and dry the house out, together with moisture meters.

Since my initial post the floors have gone down by 50% but are still warped. I have decided to get a different carpenter back, and when the original carpenter sends his bill I will deduct it accordingly!!! Needless to say the original carpenter will not be getting the second fix contract either!!!! Which is foolish on his part - given the current climate!! More fool him!
 
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