Wooden Oak Floorboards... slightly warped HELP!!!

Gandalf23

Hi folks... any help / advice on this much appreciated.

I bought some lovely French Oak floorboards for my new build house from BTW about 2 weeks ago. My carpenter said the concrete floor they were going to be laid on (the floor is going to be floated directly onto the concrete) had too much moisture, so I am waiting for the moisture content to go down (which is happening slowly but surely). I stacked the floorboards on 3 wooden lats and slit the plastic covering as instructed by my carpenter.

I was out at the house this morning cleaning when my Dad noticed that some of the floorboards were warped. We looked at a few of the boards and they were warped to varying degrees... some badly warped, and others less so, and some perfectly straight.

Needless to say I was very very p1ssed off by this.

Am I in big trouble here? Is there anything I can now do to fix the warped boards? Will it be possible for the carpenter to put the floor down without any problem? What should I do?

Any help really really appreciated here. Thanks in advance...
G23

Sonnenblumen

Moisture is not the only enemy, extremes of temperature can also be a source, recent weather very hot daytime temps, where boards stacked in direct sunlight? and also relative low night time temps. create wide temp fluctuations which are not good for many materials especially wood.

Wood type and grade quality will determine what is usable/not. Badly warped boards are good for burning, you can chance the others.

BTW the moisture content can be screwed up in two ways, direct contact ie stacked on a floor, but you've avoided this problem, however the boards can also absorb atmospheric moisture. Stacking in a damp room no different to stacking on a damp floor.

S

kadman

Gandalf23 wrote:

Hi folks... any help / advice on this much appreciated.

I bought some lovely French Oak floorboards for my new build house from BTW about 2 weeks ago. My carpenter said the concrete floor they were going to be laid on (the floor is going to be floated directly onto the concrete) had too much moisture, so I am waiting for the moisture content to go down (which is happening slowly but surely). I stacked the floorboards on 3 wooden lats and slit the plastic covering as instructed by my carpenter.

I was out at the house this morning cleaning when my Dad noticed that some of the floorboards were warped. We looked at a few of the boards and they were warped to varying degrees... some badly warped, and others less so, and some perfectly straight.

Needless to say I was very very p1ssed off by this.

Am I in big trouble here? Is there anything I can now do to fix the warped boards? Will it be possible for the carpenter to put the floor down without any problem? What should I do?

Any help really really appreciated here. Thanks in advance...
G23

If your carpenter instructed you to aclimatise your flooring boards in the same room as your drying concrete floor , then he is an idiot.

As Sonnenblumen correctly pointed out for you in his post , boards will take up their moisture from the room environment , so a drying room will have a very moisture laden environment, not the best for aclimatising boards to.

Cupped boards,i.e. boards that are slightly u shaped in section, looking at the end cut of the board, could be reaclimatised to straighten them , but not an easy process. Dont burn anything. What width are the boards , if they are wide enough , consider ripping and re tounging them. A joinery should be able to quote you.

Recoup the cost from the chippie, and then sack him.

kadman

Viking House

Hi Gandalf
The reason wood sometimes cups is because it dries out more on the top than the bottom and the top of the board contracts.
If the boards are prefinished (varnished) on the top and left raw on the bottom then they will take in moisture at the bottom and not the top and this will cause cupping. When you varnish or oil a raw wood table always remember to oil underneath as well for this reason.
If the floorboards are not finished then you can try dampening them down and lay concrete blocks at the ends and let them dry out with a weight on them which should sort out the cupping.
Put plastic between the blocks and the wood.
If your floorboards have a coat of varnish on top then you might consider just leaving them in a dry room between cement blocks at the ends, if this doesn't work then you may have to remove the varnish and then dampen them first.
Concrete and plaster let off a lot of moisture when they dry out so the windows and doors should be left open as much as possible with new builds.
This also prevents moisture making its way into insulation. Wet insulation doesn't work.

Gandalf23

Thanks very much for the replys guys... much appreciated.

A bit more info... the boards are over 2 meters in lenght and approximately 6-8 inches wide (just guessing here... didnt take exact measurements). I think this is the wood here the "Fench Oak Robust".

The boards are also finished with varnish/laquer of some sort (the salesgirl said 5 individual coats) on one side.

Looking at the boards there is a wide variety of warping. Some boards are perfectly straight. Others are warped along the lenght of the board... when you look along the lenght of the wood its possible to see the warping. The width of the boards seems to be fairly straight.

I moved the boards into a different tiled room out of all direct sunlight and kept them on the slats. The heating is on in all rooms of the house at a constant 15C.

So whats the final verdict on this? Should I attempt to straighten the boards by putting weights on either end? Will the carpenter be able to work with boards like this, and if so will my floor look like a map of the Wicklow mountains and creak? Will I ultimately have to replace the badly warped boards or can they be recovered?

Thanks again for all the help... G23

Sonnenblumen

Sorry but cannot give a straight answer to your question - solution depends on other aspects. Here's my tuppence worth:

Time : when do you expect to reach the appropriate moisture content (typically 3% and less) for chippie to install floor? This time of year it can be achieved relatively quickly but during inclemnt weather and despite the assistance of hot air blowers, de-humidifiers etc, it can take 4 weeks or longer to take down the moisture level.
On the otherhand it may/may not take as long to rectify some of the warped boards. If you have time you can try some of the suggestions offered for rectifying some of the lesser damaged boards. Me I'd bit the bullet.

Bite the Bullet: a bad chippie will use poor boards which will probably only manifest itself weeks/months post installation at which point it will be considerably more expensive to rectify 'Wicklow ridges'. In this case you're probably wiser to bite the bullet and replace spoiled boards with new, you could try and persuade the stockist to be a little kinder, and the chippie to be a little more mindful.

It's a pain where it hurts but it can get worse, avoid false economy and always remember, if its worth doing, do it right. I'm a great believer of doing it once but doing it right.


S.

kadman

6-8 inch wide boards are too wide for oak boards to remain stable and flat . Unless they were quartersawn boards from the start , then width wise it would not be a problem. They are not quartersawn , because if they were , regardless of the moisture issue, environmental humidity would have little effect on qsawn boards. Unless you specifically ordered q sawn boards , its most likely that you have tangetially cut boards.

Tangentially cut boards ( look at the end of the board, and you may see growth rings running from edge to edge, or in a curved manner. If you do thats a tcut board. the growth rings will have an inherent need to straighten, hence the cupping . T cut boards should not be laid in wide widths, as they are prone to movement, and not as stable as qsawn boards. Unless you fully understand the movement and limitations of tsawn over qsawn oak, its virtually impossible for YOU to fix your problem.

Best option if you want to re use your existing material, is to rip and machine the boards into narrowere lengths.

Dont be tempted to double nail wide boards, inn the hope that you will hold them down straight. They will split, as you've removed the ability of the wide boards to move, which they need to.

I would not be happy with the guy that opened that exposed your good timber , to a water laden environment.

End of rant

kadman

kadman

Just had a look at your link. Timber in the pic is tangentially cut, or through and through. definitely not quartersawn.

Do not burn or scrap any of the discarded timber, Use it for furniture or kitchen doors ect.
kadman

CJhaughey

Just another small tip regarding wood flooring, when laying always use a layer of polyethene between the white jiffy foam and the concrete if you are floating the floor, it helps stop the moisture in the concrete migrating through the foam and into the wood floor causing cupping.
The plastic doesn't have to be very strong 500 gauge was enough for my floor.
A roll is approximately 15 euro .

Gandalf23

Thanks again guys for all the replys.

I cant get hold of my carpenter, but will have a "lively" chat with him tomorrow no doubt.

I have read all the options posted above a few times now, and getting more depressed the more I read. None of them are that attractive to me. I spent a long time choosing this wood and it was bloody expensive even on sale.

Is there no possibility of straightning the boards enough to use them by putting weights on either end? Am I just fooling myself by even trying? I dont want false economy or problems later on, but is there ANY way I can fix my existing wood enough to use it (without having to rip/saw/narrow it)?

kadman

Gandalf23 wrote:

Thanks again guys for all the replys.

I cant get hold of my carpenter, but will have a "lively" chat with him tomorrow no doubt.

I have read all the options posted above a few times now, and getting more depressed the more I read. None of them are that attractive to me. I spent a long time choosing this wood and it was bloody expensive even on sale.

Is there no possibility of straightning the boards enough to use them by putting weights on either end? Am I just fooling myself by even trying? I dont want false economy or problems later on, but is there ANY way I can fix my existing wood enough to use it (without having to rip/saw/narrow it)?

Its virtually impossible to give you the answer you are looking for without an actual picture, taken looking at the end section of a board. What you desribe as warping, may in actual fact be cupping, or twisting in the length. Bowing is another term , that again is different.

You have been given solutions for varying situations, but you need to apply the correct one, for the given situation.

A picture is worth a 1000 words

Please

kadman

Gandalf23

I cant see any Cupping and Crowning

What I have is Bowing ("horns up" bowing I think) to different degrees in different floorboards.

I'll try to get a picture tomorrow from my phone but not sure how much detail that will show (crappy camera... been spending all my money on wood floors lately...)

What solutions are there to bowing? Can bowing be fixed by putting a weight in the middle of the wood? Can the carpenter put down a floor if some of the floorboards are "horns up" bowed?

Gandalf23

Attached is what some of my floorboards look like... googled the pic.

It says in the accompaning article that this may not be a big problem... "Sometimes it took two people to hold the bowed boards down and drive them snug. But once they were fastened in place they stayed put."

I have a smidgen of hope for the first time today. What say you experts?

Do-more

Sonnenblumen wrote:

Time : when do you expect to reach the appropriate moisture content (typically 3% and less) for chippie to install floor? This time of year it can be achieved relatively quickly but during inclemnt weather and despite the assistance of hot air blowers, de-humidifiers etc, it can take 4 weeks or longer to take down the moisture level.
Me I'd bit the bullet.

Don't be fooled into thinking that the floor is dry just because it appears so on the surface. Even if it looks dry on the surface there can still be a lot of moisture at depth. As soon as you place an impervious layer on top of the slab the moisture will come into equilibrium throughout it's depth. How long it takes to dry will depend on a lot of things, the depth of the concrete, the surface of the concrete (is it a tight surface, powerfloated? if so it will take longer) Ideal drying conditions. Make sure that the house is properly ventilated to remove the moisture. At present the weather is very humide so you have a reduced RH gradient between the slab and the air, meaning that there is not great drying at present despite the heat.

One possible indicator is to tape a sq. metre of clear polythene to the floor in the centre of the room, if after 3 days you don't have any darkening in the centre of the plastic then your slab is looking dry. This is only an indicator mind!

CJH is very correct in stating that a good damp proof membrane should be used.

BTW your link is to a solid wood floor, who advised you that this is suitable for "floating"? Not something I would do...

kadman

Horns up , or horns down material can be used successfuly, if fixed directly to the floor substrata, whether the floor is battens, plywood ect.

It is possible to float any floor, whether its solid, semi solid , laminate ect.
As Do-More correctly pointed out , solid timber, especislly wide boards , are not the best choice to float. As there is obviously more movement in wider material. Your comment " Someteimes it took 2 people to hold the floor boards down " is fine in the context of then fixing the boards to battens , ect to hold them in place. But you wont have this benefit in a floating floor. And it is an element you need , if the boards are so bad , they need 20 stone to flatten them.

Hire a moisture meter, and check the bowed boards against the straight ones.

If you were direct fixing them, you should be ok. If of course the boards are dry to the correct moisture content. Specified moisture content of the boards should be marked on the packet. And as pointed out by an earlier poster, check the moisture content of the floor. Your carpenter should know this, as it should have been his first duty before he exposed the timber to a damp environment.

kadman

squire1

Gandalf23 wrote:

I stacked the floorboards on 3 wooden lats and slit the plastic covering as instructed by my carpenter.

Is this the problem? I always understood that it was best to leave the packaging intact as they are shrink wrapped and supported to maintain the integrity of the board.

Every "expert" I ask gives a different opinion on this. Anyone know for sure what is best.