One additional piece of info: we have a 3x7 powder room right next door to this bedroom with the exact same floor, same subfloor installed the same way with no sign of any flaws at all. Also a small closet with no issues.

I am so sorry! Are the bumps where the nails are? How many coats of the floor leveling material were used? We just installed Marmoleum over ceramic tile and the installer did 3 coats of fill over 3 days prior to installing. I am wondering if there was insufficient fill used over the nails. I hope the installer can give you a remedy!

Armchair detective thinks subfloor was not glued to floor joists and nails were put in with a hammer, not a nail gun? Flooring installers would have used a nail gun that would countersink the nail and generally made it impossible to remove.

Sorry, armchair detective, the were glued to the joists and also shot in with a nail gun. Paslode ring shank nails.

They are nail pops from the humidity change. You'll get them in drywall too, especially in new construction where the home has a lot of moisture in it at construction time and dries out over the year. Winter is especially bad for it. Sorry, but the "fault" is that the subfloor should have been installed with screws, not nails. It's a tighter bond, and there would have been less seasonal movement.

There really isn't going to be a "repair" for that unless you are willing to pull up the floors, remove the nails, and rescrew the underlayment.

Would taking it up ruin the floor or could you reuse that piece? You could try putting something over the nails and whacking it to see if the nails will go down. Just make sure it's something that won't break! Don't whack the floor directly. If you don't want to remove the floor, pick a bump in a place you won't see much to try this in case it looks worse. I'm not sure if the material will flatten or remain buckled once stretched like that, but worth a shot if you decide to rip up anyway.

I am so sorry you have this to contend with.

Not just nails show, but I think the plywood joint line also shows faintly between the two rows of nails at the top.
Does that increase the possibility that insufficient floor leveling was used? Or is it due to the plywood shifting/warping as the nails have thrust up.

Live wire oak: it's certainly in the realm of possibility, but it's so odd that we have none of this problem in the pwdr room and closet...exact same installation and materials.

Williamsem: it's not one piece, it is the whole floor. Every single nail head is visible and all the plywood seams.

Bellsmom: Yes, it's disappointing. I wonder about the floor leveling and also wonder if the plywood shrunk now that the heat is on and the nails are becoming visible along with the seams. We did read in an old GW flooring thread that someone had marmoleum over tile and the installers did 3 layers of leveling over a 3 day period. Maybe the nails should have been set deeper? One would think the specialty marmoleum installers should know this kind of stuff, though. Esp. since they are the ones that told us that the subfloor was fine the way we did it.

We are not inclined to rip up the floor and start over. It's a small second bedroom 10x10. Most of it will be covered by rug and furniture anyway.

I wrote the company and they were decent about replacing the messed up seam last fall, so... at this point, we'd be happy with some credit towards the carpet we'll need later on. Or if not, it's an (expensive) lesson learned. Good grief.

oh, Deedles, I am so sorry.

My DH asked what you were nailing into? What is under the plywood you put down?

I'm sorry about these troubles. It is so hard to get everything perfectly right, IMO. I wonder about the use of nails vs. screws and if the flooring professionals who advised you on what to do, would have had the same result? If so they dodged a bullet so to speak by not doing that part of the job.

My husband definitely used screws with ours. He did exterior grade plywood, screwed down. He then sanded it until it was level. The installers just applied aheasive to the plywood, laid the Marmoluem, and then rolled it flat. We have no marks like this.

My husband also said that sometimes when you nail in straight lines, as opposed to random placement, it will show through.

While we don't have this issue, we do have a few areas in the kitchen where it pops a little when you step on it. Probably a gap that didn't get completely aheared to the plywood. It goes away in the winter, so maybe your problem will go away in the summer!

Oh deedles, yuck. I'm so sorry. Is this the floor in your kitchen?

I'm wondering how expensive it would be to rip it up yourselves, prepare the plywood as senator13's husband did, and then get installers in to complete. I'm all for the DIY but in some cases, when one is so sick of the progress/lack of, it's worth the splurge to get the job done quickly and with the desired results.

((Hugs))
((Wine too:)))

donaleen: The is the only floor. It's Sturdifloor 3/4" tongue and groove plywood something something and it's meant to be the only subfloor. But it's glued and nailed to 2x10's on 16" centers.

Senator13: the summer idea occurred to me :) Like a stopped clock is right twice a day, our 2nd bedroom floor will look like chickenpox 5 months a year.

Oldbat2be: ugh. Tearing it up isn't anything we want to do at this point. If it was a main room, then we'd have to but it is just a second bedroom. I'm thinking a LARGE rug is a good idea. And wait for summer and hope it goes away for awhile when the plywood swells.

Oh, and large bottle of wine from the gas station (DH needed minnows so he brought me some wine :) is helping quite a bit, too. It has a cork and it's from 2011, so....

We had Marmoleum installed a few months ago. Despite a really strong subfloor, the installers were clear that they wanted to use "underlayment grade" plywood for another layer. When I looked at the Forbo installation manual, they specify using staples which is I believe how ours was laid.
Then there was the troweled on layer of stuff which I guess was the leveling compound.
From what I've heard, Forbo is really good at trying to get the bottom of problems, so I'd call their customer service line and see what they say.
Good luck!

Have you tried pushing on one of the dots? Does it push down flat or do you actually feel the nail beneath it?

gbsim: That's exactly what we've found the problem to be. The flooring people told us that the subfloor we had was fine, but it SHOULD have had another layer like yours did. Also, Forbo say NOT to use leveler on plywood as the moisture causes the wood to swell. The plywood swelling around the nails (from the moisture in the leveling compound) caused a depression in the plywood at the nails and then the installer went over that with the glue and the linoleum immediately. Now when the wood has finally dried out, the leveler that was in the depression that the nail made when the wood swelled, is now showing itself as a 'lump' through the linoleum. It is the installers fault, as we had THREE professionals out there, the first one said our subfloor was fine (we specifically asked if what we had was okay or did we need to do anything else), the second one that went to Forbo school installed over what he should have known was a problem underlayment and the third guy that fixed the floor mistakes the first guy made never said anything either. It's apparent that this company is not familiar with this product in a residential setting.

The CEO of the company emailed us today asking specifics and DH has been going back and forth with him today. He is being decent and says if it's determined that it's their fault, they'll eat the cost of the floor. Don't see how they could reach any other conclusion, with all the info on the Forbo site saying NOT to do exactly what their guys did.

jerzeegirl: The dots are hard but I gently tapped one and it seemed to flatten a little bit. DH doesn't want me to do that as he thinks the flooring with split or crack. I guess I'll wait to see what the heck we end up doing before I experiment any more. Maybe like Senator said, our problem will go away in the summer when it's more humid, lol.

Buyer beware (and inform yourself utterly). Hoping this thread is helpful down the road to anyone contemplating marmoleum. Its such beautiful stuff, but boy if the installers don't know what they are doing, forget it.

I am so sorry you had this trouble after expecting the professionals to install it correctly. I had considered marmoleum but got scared that I couldn't find an installer and stuck with tile.