Floating Plank Flooring Problems

Floating floors require floor prep floating floors do require subfloor prep.

Floating plank flooring problems.

One of the major causes of buckling in vinyl plank flooring is expansion and contraction of the material. When it comes to glue down vinyl plank flooring you can choose self sticking planks or planks that require a coat of adhesive on the subfloor. They are not made to hide bad subfloors. In the colder weather the opposite is true and the floor can contract leaving gaps between two of the tiles.

Most often cupping happens when flooring is installed over a wet basement or crawlspace. This is generally caused by a lack of expansion space between the flooring and the surrounding walls and moldings. Wide plank floors are more prone to cupping but i ve seen it happen to strip flooring as well. This flooring is generally installed as a floating floor that simply rests on the underlayment with no glue down bond necessary.

This means surface water and spills won t affect the flooring. The adhesive on self stick planks is pressure sensitive and one of the problems with it is that it won t adhere to a dusty or nonlevel surface. The third of our floating floor problems peaking occurs when two laminate floor boards are forced together by pressure which causes them to peak at the seam or joint resulting in a high spot in the flooring. As the material becomes warmer it can expand slightly causing the floor to buckle.

While floating floors do not have the same expansion and contraction problems that real hardwood floors do they do dry out and shrink a little in dry climates and may slightly expand in wet climates. Vinyl plank flooring uses a click lock system in which the edges and ends of the planks snap together. The pros of vinyl flooring. The biggest advantage of vinyl plank flooring is the fact that it is 100 water resistant.

Expansion can create warping problems or uneven boards and when contracting the boards can develop crack like spaces from plank to plank. The subfloor flatness requirements for a floating floor are the same as for a glue down floor.