Are you getting unfinished or prefinished wood installed? And is it solid or engineered?

By humidty in wood you mean the moisture level. If the subfloor and the wood are within 2% as your contractor says. Then thats perfectly acceptable.
Acclimating the wood is designed to allow the subfloor and wood planks to reach a common reading in moisture content.

If the humidty outside was at 65% and you have no ac its not a deal breaker but there should be some way to control the indoor levels to stay at a constant.

Wood floors move. Regardless of how well kept your environmental conditions are. You cant stop the wood from expanding and contracting. You can minimalize the amount by keeping consistent conditions but you can stop it. Meaning your floor will open up in dry weather(winter) and close up in wet humid weather(summer)

If you feel a contract will make you sleep easier ok. But given the information youve given nothing is throwing up a red flag.

Thanks for responding. I'm happy to hear that you don't think this is too concerning. Everything we have read seems to stress that acclimation and a constant environment is key to a good quality install.

To answer your questions, it is unfinished solid oak flooring and there is no control over the indoor humidity and temp (doors and windows wide open all day, if not all night).

Your windows and doors are not installed??

Hello again,
The doors and windows are installed, but the construction crew leaves them open - which I presume is because it is so hot and humid (which is terrible for the floor!).

The expansion/contraction, cupping, and excessive gaps is exactly what I am worried about. Does anyone know how this can be quantified for our second contract? Something along the lines of "gaps larger than X in the summer and X in the winter are unnacceptable" - can anyone fill in the X?

Thanks again!

This post was edited by firsthome26 on Tue, Jun 25, 13 at 11:42

Specifing a specific size of gap could potentially cause issues. Even if your contractor signed the contract stating a certain size. All he would have to do is get a floor inspector and if that inspector can deem that you didnt keep the inside conditions properly then he might get off the hook in court.

Im not saying your screwed. But i think whatever contract you draw up wont protect you 100%. I think at this point i would start by hiring a certified floor inspector. This way he can be aware of the situation and will be in early enough to where if you do have issues he will have prior knowledge of your situation.

It wouldnt hurt to get a dehumidifier running to try to draw out some of the moisture. Take steps now and try to avoid any hassles

The fact you're already concerned about winter gaps tells me you'll never be satisfied and rightfully so. Have you considered a humidification system for the home to be used in the winter months?

All night? I'm guessing a lot more moisture is creeping into the house than you may think. Think dew point.

Problem is the flooring is already installed and since it has been installed without HVAC and or proper acclimation it may never be right!

I don't know what it is with builders and the wrong order of operations. You should go over to the Building a Home forum and read threeapples saga about the exact same thing. She lost all of her leverage over having it fixed because she took her builder's word that he would take care of the issues after the fact instead of ripping it out and starting over. Now, the project is still having issues, and other things have been installed afterwards, and the flooring would be more difficult to remove, and the builder still doesn't want to make things right. That's your future right there unless you can get a certified flooring inspector involved now to tell the builder to replace it NOW.

There are two important criteria here. It sounds like only one was considered.

The first is the one considered. The moisture difference between the flooring and subfloor should be very small.

The second is the moisture difference between the flooring when installed and the flooring during normal living conditions. Ignoring this is inviting great surprises once the house comes to a near steady state condition post construction.

Thanks to everyone for their input. Needless to say I am very frustrated that my builder refuses to follow well-known guidelines (and refuses to acknowledge that it could lead to a problem). We are getting a certified flooring inspector involved and with his assistance will try to construct a contract that will protect us in the future. While it would be a terrible inconvenience to have to vacate our home to have floors replaced in the future, unfortunately this seems to be our best option at this time. Thanks again.

Can you provide an update? Did you have an inspector out? What were the results? What was done -- if anything? How are your floors today?

I'm dealing with similar issues with the hardwood floor in our new home (also installed prior to the HVAC). :(

bump

Just to chime in, that happened to us on our first home, and the cupping bothered me for years!

Most builders just don't care. They want to put the hardwood in prior to setting the doors and trimming out the house. They see it as time and effort saved - but in actuality they're causing you a ton of issues down the road.

We used to supply the largest building supply in the nation hardwood flooring to their yards in the southeast. Believe me, I have seen it all.

Some flooring retailers (who should know better) aren't any better at doing it right . One of the largest flooring retailers in the south is located in Knoxville TN. These guys were picking up our solid 3-1/4 prefinished oak from their warehouse at 7 am and nailing it down in new construction projects with no HVAC by 9 am. They were at the time a 20 million dollar a year single store location and didn't even OWN a moisture meter. Needless to say there were issues......lots of issues.

In addition to the gaps between boards, there are numerous cracks on the face or surface. Some of them are along a grain line, some not and some across the grain even. One of the cracks is wide enough to put a dime in it.

Plus, I'm noticing lots of areas along the edge / between boards where there is a crack about an inch long -- it almost looks like a nail hole. But I don't think they were there previously and there's quite a few of them (I'd say I've seen at least 10 or more).

Would the boards shrinking cause those things too?

A NWFA Certified Inspector is coming May 11.

What?happened ? Just curious

Michellelongcpa what has happened? I have cracks in my boards to. Wood wasn’t acclimated according to manufacturers suggestions.