Q: I’ve been reading many of the questions/answers in this column and I have an idea about the cause of our problem, but here goes…
We had a Shaw Versalock floor installed in our new construction home, in the kitchen and dining area, in the fall of ’06 (“Natural Splendor” Sanibel). It’s installed over a plastic liner over the concrete sub-floor. Recently I noticed there are a couple of spots where the seam seems to be lifting, and a gap is visible. From what I’ve read here it is not recommended to install these “floating” floors under cabinets or anything very heavy. And unfortunately, our floor is installed under the cabinets in the kitchen; we also have a refrigerator in the area on the floor.
My conclusion: the installation was probably done incorrectly, and we failed to do adequate research about this type of flooring. My question: is there anything we can do, other than replacing/redoing the floor? The builder never indicated that this could be a problem. At this point, I anticipate that we will only see more places on the floor where this “raising” will occur.
I’d appreciate any insights/advice you can provide!
Thank you.
Kathleen
Catawissa, PA
A: Your guess here is on par with what is most likely occurring. Typically with any floating floor if a very heavy object such as cabinetry is installed on the floor, usually at an edge, it will cause the floor to shift, similar to a teeter-totter with weight only on one side. Occasionally this will come from a combination of slight differences in the subfloor along with weight distribution along the edges of a floor.
One way to try to relieve this pressure would be to cut a relief into the floor along the cabinetry line. Essentially this will make a small platform of flooring for the cabinets and disconnect the rest of the floor from the floor underneath the heavier objects. Over a few days, the gapping you are experiencing should slowly revert back to the floor being as it was when it was installed.
