Small gaps, cracks, dents and holes can occur in your prefinished wood flooring. These gaps are really not hard to fill and most anyone can do it with a bit of Wood Putty. This putty will never fully harden and is available in colors to match just about any floor from a maple or white oak to a Brazilian cherry, black walnut or just about anything in between. When you are unable to find a color of Wood Putty that matches your floor you can actually take a couple of colors and with your fingers blend them together before use and come up with a pretty good match. Remember that when finished you will be viewing the job standing and not from your hands and knees so the fill should be pretty hard to see.

Wood Putty can be purchased at your local paint store or at a big box store like Home Depot or Lowes. Usually the best selection will be at a larger paint store. To apply the Wood Putty get a blob and with your finger rub it into the crack. Using a paper towel rub the area quickly and vigorously to remove the excess putty. If you selected the right color of putty in the first place you should be pleased with the finished appearance.

For an even more finished appearance, using a rag with a bit of natural color wood stain or sealer, carefully wipe it across the putty in a single swipe. You now have a bit of sheen on the putty so that it will better match a higher sheen on the flooring.

The Difference between Wood Putty and Wood Filler

On prefinished flooring where you want to fill holes, cracks and splits but not refinish the floor wood putty is a better choice than wood filler. Wood filler is a wetter, more fluid product than wood putty. Wood Putty has more of the consistency of damp clay and while it will harden some it does not fully dry. The putty should not come out with normal foot traffic and since it does not fully dry wood putty holds well with the normal expansion and contraction of your flooring. For a new site finished floor, wood filler is used as it is sandable and like wood it will take a stain and for this reason it is used to fill gaps and cracks prior to applying the finish to a floor.

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The largest percentage of complaints when it comes to both wood and bamboo are moisture related.  The moisture is usually due to a site related condition.  Frequently a moisture problem is caused by conditions such as water under the structure, leaking pipe, excessively wet concrete or too much moisture in a buildings structural components at the time the floor is installed.  Improper maintenance also results in the introduction of excess moisture.

The major component in many cleaning chemicals is water.  Water can have a detrimental effect on both wood and bamboo floors which are hygroscopic materials.  When bamboo and wood are exposed to air their tendency is to either dry or gain in moisture.  The loss or gain in moisture will continue until the material is in equilibrium with the humidity and air temperature.  If too much moisture is gained these materials will swell and if too much moisture is lost they will shrink.  While bamboo is somewhat more stable then wood in this respect, both are affected.

Wood is dimensional stable at its saturation point of 25-30% moisture content.  Below this point it begins to shrink until it reaches 0%.  As it starts to gain in moisture it expands until it reaches the saturation point again.  Once back at the saturation point of 25-30% it again stabilizes.

When wood floors are manufactured it is kiln dried to an average of 6-9% Bamboo floors are usually kiln dried to 8-10%.  Both wood and bamboo when made into a floor are dried significantly below the saturation point.  Once at this point the flooring is expected to stabilize with the environment in which it is installed.  Since the floor still has a natural tendency to gain or loose moisture, it is imperative that the environment be maintained at a suitable level.

The expansion and contraction of floor material is not equal in all directions.  As an example, a solid piece of wood that was over dried to 0% and allowed to increase to its saturation point of 28%, will increase by about 0.1% longitudinally or along the length/grain.  The same piece of wood will increase 2 -8% perpendicular to the annular growth rings (racially or in strip width for flooring that is quarter sawn.  If the floor is plain sawn flooring the increase will be parallel to the trees annular growth rings (tangentially or in strip width.)  With engineered flooring the expansion will be significantly less.  The reason for this is that alternating layers of the laminate are prepared to run in opposite directions.  Since they are not all running in the same direction they have a natural tendency to pull against one another, which helps to maintain stability. While the engineered floor is more stable in this respect, equilibrium moisture content still remains critical.  The moisture content of wood and bamboo that is in storage or installed at a point below its fiber saturation point has a natural tendency to fluctuate.  This fluctuation is a result of changes in the relative humidity and air temperature within the environment in which the material is stored or installed.

An understanding of equilibrium moisture content (EMC) is important.  EMC is the point at which moisture is not being gained or lost.  Table 1 demonstrates the relationship between temperature and humidity and its resultant EMC.  Wood and bamboo will provide excellent performance for many years if properly maintained.  EMC is a major factor in its maintenance. 

Table 1: Moisture content of wood in equilibrium with stated dry-bulb temperature in Fahrenheit and relative humidity. *

*From the Wood Handbook: Wood as an Engineering Material, 1999, the Forest Products laboratory, U.S. Department of Agriculture.

The equilibrium moisture content (EMC) is not the same for all locals.  Weather conditions, heat and humidity are not the same in all parts of the country.  Take a look at the Moisture Content Map (table 1).  Take a look at Oregon, the authors state and you will see 8-13 along the coast and 5-7 in the rest of the state.  What this map is telling you is that the normal point of EMC along the coast is 8% in January and 13% in July and inland it is 5% in January and 7% in July.  Now take a look at your own state and you may see and entirely different set of variables.

Moisture and humidity are changing throughout the day – throughout the year.  Additionally there are long-term seasonal changes in relative humidity and temperature.  Since wood and bamboo are hygroscopic material they are also experiencing continuing change throughout the day – throughout the year. 

In a dry climate and during the heating season wood and bamboo will shrink and this is normal.  Expansion is also normal in wetter climates and when exposed to wet conditions.  To maintain the floor at the proper EMC as exhibited in the tables; the environment needs to be carefully monitored. Wood and bamboo perform best in a controlled environment that has a relative humidity between 30-50% and room temperature of 60-80%.  These are the same levels that humans are most comfortable at.  In addition to temperature controls on a furnace, the use of a dehumidifier to remove moisture from the air or humidifier to add moisture to the air will be important in many parts of the country.

As stated earlier, engineered flooring (laminated flooring), due to its multiple layers that are glued together, will shrink and expand less than that of a solid floor. 

With an engineered wood floor the grain of each layer runs at a 90-degree angle to that of the adjacent layer, working against each other to maintain stability. 

Bamboo wants to bend and curl just like planks from a tree.  With an engineered bamboo floor the strips need to be directionally balanced.  On a 3-layer laminate, this is accomplished by arranging the strips so that on top and bottom layers the hard side is facing outward. Some manufacturers will randomly orient strips within the middle layer.  With bamboo, some manufacturers will have all of the layers running in the same direction and this is unacceptable.

While engineered wood products have a built in resistance to shrinkage and expansion and can be installed in areas with a wide ranges in humidity the EMC must still be controlled.

A Shameless Industry – by Terry Weinheimer

Most rational adults recognize the exaggerated marketing techniques used by the magazine sweepstakes industry. Almost monthly you receive mailers announcing that your name has been selected to win a large amount of money. Of course, when you read the small print you will usually understand the difference between being selected to win and actually winning. In reality it should come as no surprise that you are just being baited to purchase magazine subscriptions. Yes, you might win something; you probably have a one in a million chance of winning the 50-cent prize and a one in a billion chance of winning that grand prize.

While I hate to admit it, I often see advertising in the floor covering industry that is reminisce of the sweepstakes industry. It is shameless that our own industry day-after-day advertises floors as if they were indestructible and self-cleaning when we know this not to be true. Just like the suckers that bite on the magazine deals, gullible individuals that fail to read the small print in our own ads are taking the bait. Some of the most misleading manufacturers and retailers produce and sell some fine floor covering products. In their quest for a larger market share these otherwise respectable companies allow the advertising departments to push the limits.

Consumers are purchasing flooring products based on the way they perceive the advertising. When they find that their new floor actually requires care and is not indestructible they feel violated or believe that the product is truly defective. Within months of installation the complaints start to pour in but the practice of misleading advertising seems to continue.

In addition to the exaggerated advertising claims our industry has many sales people who stretch the limits even further to make a sale! Week-after-week and day-after-day, as a floor-covering inspector/consultant this author investigates claims where flooring products have been sold as indestructible. At many of these installations the consumer has done everything possible to prove that these indestructible floors can be damaged. Scratch resistant floors have been sold as scratch proof and they often look as if someone has used a garden rake on them. Some floors are swollen and popping off the substrate from leaking dishwashers, broken pipes or pure abuse and the consumer insist they have been told that no amount of water would damage the floor.

For nearly 20 years I have been out of the sales business. I owned floor covering stores for many years. I must admit that there were times that I was tempted to oversell, and in truth there were times that I gave in to those temptations. As a young entrepreneur I had a struggling retail store. I had high goals but was not producing enough volume. The first high-volume salesperson that I ever hired turned out to be an individual that exaggerated the value and ability of products. With dollar signs in my eyes I found myself impressed by his sales production and the profit margin at which he produced. Within days of hiring this man the complaints started to come in from consumers that were misled and overcharged. My own greed had allowed me to believe that the increased sales that he had brought to our struggling store were needed.  In a very short period of time I had allowed my own greed to pull me into his gutter.

It took a couple of weeks before I started to realize that dishonest techniques were not needed to make sales and if they were I was in the wrong business. I recognized that I was giving up my self-respect, and I had been raised to respect it highly. Within the month I had let this sales person go but it took many months to overcome the damage I had allowed him to create during his short stay. From that time on, when I caught employees using blatantly misleading statements, they were immediately reminded that if they could not sell honestly they would be shown the door.

Most companies understand that our industry has no room for salespeople that are going to run your business into the ground. Some of us had to learn this the hard way!