*
The pine flooring planks in our house have developed gaps
that run the length of the board. I’m thinking they probably
just weren’t installed correctly in the first place, but
there may be other problems of expansion/contraction due
to heat/humidity (this is NC). My question is, can these
planks be saved? i.e., is there any way to “squeeze” these
boards together? Or pull them out and re-lay them properly?
Or are they just going to have to be scrapped?
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How wide are the boards, and the gaps?
This time of year, the gaps should be minimal. Gaps open in winter, not summer, unless you're running air conditioning all the time, and they were installed with a high moisture content, say in August, without acclimating to the dry air in your house.
Do you know what the moisture content of the flooring was when it was installed? What is under the floor? Is it a crawlspace? A vapor barrier of some type? Any heating in the floor? How were the boards nailed or screwed? Some info about your heating/cooling habits would possibly help too.
Could use some of this information, would save on speculation.
MD
*Sorry -- meant to put some of that stuff in and then gotdistracted by cats who wanted to help type.The boards are about 6" wide and the gaps vary from 1/8" to 0.(to be honest, I'm describing the situation from memory,as this is a house we are in the process of buying.)I don't know the moisture content of the flooring when itwas installed or if it was allowed to acclimate to the roombefore being installed. For the floors downstairs, thereis a crawlspace under the floor (which is going to have a vapor barrier put in but hasn't had one since the house wasbuilt), but the gaps also exist in the floor upstairs. Thereis no heating in the floor (I assume you were refering toradiant heating?). I am almost certain the floor was nailedin (I know it wasn't screwed). Heating and ac are done witha heat pump, but I think this hasn't been set to "normal" levelswhile the house has been vacant for the last year. When I sawthe house, it was a "normal" temp inside (probably in the 70s).Also, the house was built in 1982, and I'm pretty sure this floor dates to that time.Thanks for the response!
*sound like fairly common gaps... you can't "fix" them... you can measure the relative humidity in the house and bring all of the wood to a moisture state of equilibrium of about 12% ideal...but for health purposes.. in a CLOSED house you want about 30 - 40% RH ..dryer and you will have respiratory and wood shrinkage problems..wetter and you will have mold and condensation problems...i'd learn to love the gaps...and use area rugs..
*I left wide pine flooring in a shed for a year, then stacked it in the dining room for 2 months with the woodstove going, and then I layed the floor. 2 years later I had gaps....my answer was to route them square (using a sacrificial bit for the occasional nail) and put in butternut. It sands up real nice and looks great...but I guess you have to like different woodsUbiqueRegan
*The gaps aren't very unusual for pine of that width. I wouldn't worry too much about them getting worse; the house was done no favors sitting by itself, and with all things considered, it doesn't seem too bad.
*Sounds normal to me, all things considered.The old way of hiding this was to wax the floors. Wax can be of a colour. It will fill gaps and then harden so as to make them unnoticeable. It the wood swells again, it squeezes the wax back out so slowly it gets walked off without noticing. Slight nicks and scrapes are in the wax surface instead of the wood so it can be renewed.Wax is a woods best friend but housekeepers, proffesional, wives, or whatever, hate it because of the yearly renewal process. It IS hard work!Re humidity - Three weeks ago I took some 1x6" poplar to the job for baseboard out of my shop attic where it was under 11% moisture and measured right at 5-1/2". After two weeks on the job in humid weather it had swelled to almost 5-5/8".Summers here!
*
The pine flooring planks in our house have developed gaps
that run the length of the board. I'm thinking they probably
just weren't installed correctly in the first place, but
there may be other problems of expansion/contraction due
to heat/humidity (this is NC). My question is, can these
planks be saved? i.e., is there any way to "squeeze" these
boards together? Or pull them out and re-lay them properly?
Or are they just going to have to be scrapped?