Selling Bamboo Flooring In Arid Zones – Uniform Commercial Code

unlocked strand clickI receive several calls through the course of a year from people who have purchased bamboo flooring and are having issues with the floor either falling apart, splitting, cracking and finish checking. I just now got off the phone with one such consumer which caused to to blog about this. This consumer purchased his click stranded bamboo from a nation wide chain.

Floating Vinyl Plank; Do’s and Don’ts

Personally, I love to install floating vinyl planks. Not many floors are easier to install with just a straight edge, roller and utility knife and maybe a tapping block for the newer click together ones in a residential setting. However, I see a few commonly repeated mistakes when out doing inspections on these floors that can easily be avoided. These issues are not solely DIY issues either as even some professionals have the same problem.

Installation Related Failure Percentages; Myth or Fact?

How many things do you see wrong here?

We’ve all heard the percentage of flooring failures that are installation related are sky high. Some industry professionals peg it up around 70% to 90 %. When you hear these numbers people automatically presume these installations are all related to poor installation practices by professional installers. I have found that to be misleading.

Calls from Consumers and DIY’ers About Flooring Problems

I guess because of my exposure on the internet forums I get lots of calls from frustrated consumers. I don’t mind helping people out, it makes me feel good and is great for the Karma. Like the front page says, so many people get conflicting answers on the internet, even very bad advice.

Humidification of Hardwood Flooring in Arid Zones – (Revised Edition from my Floorbiz.com Article)

A common complaint about hardwood floors in arid zones is checking and splitting due to low humidity. Many people believe running a humidifier in arid zones in summer is futile. This is largely due to the fact that an AC unit is a de-humidifier. These will counter act each other but not totally as your AC does not run continually and this counter reaction by the AC unit can be neutralized to a point with a stand alone humidifier. However, some checking should be expected in your wood flooring if the relative humidity gets to low as nothing can be 100% effective. I see more and more manufacturers putting these relative humidity requirements in ink. Even right on the outside of the boxes.

Wrapping Around a Wall With Hardwood Using Control Lines

This post is from an article in a column I write at FloorBiz.com. Visit my column here for more interesting articles.

Having seen and heard of mistakes concerning wrapping around walls through multiple doorways with a hardwood floor I decided to write a little about it and post some pictures. Using other flooring materials like tile or patterned carpet can cause hesitation and some hair pulling even for seasoned installers. Some you can fudge and some need to be dead on.