<p>Our engineered hardwood floor was glued to the slab foundation 12 years ago. Beginning just this past summer, we noticed moisture and we can’t find the source. </p>
<p>It appears up only in the middle of our bedroom and a closet. At the walls the floor is dry and beautiful, but large spots in the room show evidence of moisture (mildew, discoloration, cracking, warping). There is no plumbing in the area and nothing running under the house. </p>
<p>We water the foundation with soaker hose to avoid settling (a common problem in our area), but we’ve done that consistently over the years. The problem is not evident at the walls near the soaker hose.</p>
<p>We pulled up some of the floor revealing the slab. There is no moisture barrier in place. At first the slab felt damp, but after a few weeks the moisture is gone (presumably evaporated).</p>
<p>Any ideas about how to locate the problem so we can replace the floor with confidence it won’t recur?</p>
<p>I have no words of advice, but I’ve been told not to put hardwood directly over concrete because concrete contains moisture and it will inevitably leak into the wood.</p>
<p>We had a small spot between our kitchen (which has a wooden subfloor) and our office (which has a concrete slab) and we tiled it, instead of continuing the hardwood from the kitchen.</p>
<p>This sounds so basic it’s almost silly, but do you maybe have a pet that’s been either going to the bathroom or drooling on the floor? I know theoretically you would be able to smell the urine, but if it’s drool or something like that, you may not.</p>
<p>Nope, neither pets nor people are leaking their bodily fluids onto our floors and no plants in the area being watered. Wish it were that easy! </p>
<p>I agree, the lack of a moisture barrier under the floor seems problematic. I’m thinking there should have been one in the installation process. But, odd it wouldn’t be a problem for over a decade, don’t you think?</p>
<p>When I had my hardwood floors refinished on the main floor, I asked the owner of the company to install hardwood in the basement bedrooms. He basically said that he could do it and it would look nice for a while, but eventually it would have the problems that you are having. He told me that in order to install hardwood on concrete, you have to put a float floor underneath the hardwood and that the cost for the float floor was prohibitive. Needless to say, the kids bedrooms have carpet. </p>
<p>I wonder, too, about the concrete leaching moisture up into your hardwood. We live in a wet area and my garage floor in rainy times is often damp, not pooling wet, but looks darker and if I walk in the garage with socks, I never feel wet spots, but my socks will be damp when I am done.</p>
<p>The house was built in the 70s and this floor was installed after carpet was removed about 12 years ago. There is no subfloor and, we think, no troweled vapor barrier on the slab under the flooring. The wood seems to be glued directly to the concrete slab, but DH plans to look again tonight to see whether that’s really the case.</p>
<p>So, when we replace all the old flooring, if we have to select something different because a vapor barrier makes hardwoods prohibitively expensive, what other non-carpet options should we consider? The rooms now all have hardwood and nice rugs. Ground floor grand entry/front room, formal dining, great room, master bdrm, study, guest bath.</p>
<p>Any thoughts on whether there’s an insurance claim available for this sort of problem?</p>
<p>About the only thing I’d put on an old slab on grade that didn’t appear to have any sort of vapor barrier is ceramic tile on a vinyl base. You can use wood if you have a separation so the concrete has space to breathe. Barricade and Dricor are two brands of plywood subfloor systems designed for basements.</p>
<p>It’s a fact of life - concrete is porous. Sealers don’t last. </p>
<p>I had the same problem from the old house where bamboo floors was installed over concrete. We had to remove everything and install tiles. The water could come from other places and the concrete just absorb the moisture. Right now the only thing I can suggest is fix it and install lots of dehumidifier. You should have it in the lower level of a concrete slab house anyway.</p>
<p>Hardwoodfloorsmag.com has a forum where you can ask questions like this. My former brother in law is a wood floor inspector (PhD in engineering) and has lots of stories just like yours. Some are real head scratchers and others show some real talent for screwing up installations.</p>
<p>Ordinarily, I’d suggest asking your plumber to run a camera scope through your pipes to check for leaks, but you said nothing runs beneath your home. There are two products that might interest you, in addition to what’s already been mentioned. </p>
<p>The first is a subfloor designed for use in basements that I’ve seen used on slab foundations. It’s what dh and I plan to use for our next (and final) house. </p>
<p>I’ve seen photos, or TV shows, of several rooms done by Canadian designer Candice Olson in which she used similar vinyl planks and they looked great.</p>
<p>BTW, if you find mold under the floor, all bets are off, you need to remove everything and perhaps tile would be the best choice, which we did in our home. When we took off the buckled bamboo floor, we found mold and asbestos vinyl tile, the contractor just quit working right there because of the asbestos tile. We had to have remove it ourselves and float bleaches until the mold is removed.</p>
<p>OK, you’ve gotten some nice advice on what to replace your flooring with, but I hate to say it: Your not fixing what might be the REAL problem, which may be YOU’VE GOT WATER LEAKING INTO YOUR HOUSE SOMEWHERE! Cheap cosmetic solutions may be fine for now, but if you just ignore the real problem, you may have BIGGER issues down the road.</p>
<p>There are some questions in my mind about your situation, so I’m going to have to make some assumptions to perhaps tell you what to look for. First, I’m assuming this slab is BELOW ground level, correct? This is a basement with the foundation as your exterior walls, right? If that is the case, the water is coming up from under your house. Remember, concrete IS porous, water will eventually seep through if not diverted. Since the signs of the leak are in the middle of the floor and not near the exterior walls, I think it is safe to say it’s not a problem with water penetration from your foundation walls, but more likely a crack in your slab due to settling (despite your “watering” of your house; seriously, I’ve never heard of that before). Most houses with foundations and slabs below ground level have a “weeping tile” system around the exterior perimeter of the foundation, which is designed to divert water away from your house. If your only seeing the water pool on your slab floor when it rains heavily, you may have a clogging issue with that weeping tile system.</p>
<p>But for now, since you want to keep it simple and cheap, remove enough flooring at least 4 feet around where the water pools and inspect the slab. If you see a crack, there are some things they sell cheaply that can fix it, like hydraulic cement. Patch the crack before you put down a new floor. Second, go find the guy who told you it was OK to place an engineered wood floor directly on a cement sub-floor and SMACK HIM! If you REALLY want a wood floor down there, you’ll need to install a separate sub-floor ( with a vapor barrier UNDER THAT!). Just install tile for now; it’s easier and cheaper.</p>
<p>Good thoughts. I agree, we have to identify and solve this before putting down a new floor. </p>
<p>We’re in Houston; no basement here. Foundation is just poured onto the leveled land. </p>
<p>I had never heard of foundation watering either, until moving to this land of gumbo dirt and shifting soil. Foundation movement is the norm in these parts for residential structures, but it can be mitigated by keeping soil moist to avoid contracting/expansion pressures from varying moisture content.</p>
<p>We do have a pool, but the water line and all related plumbing is below slab grade. </p>
<p>I agree we need to remove the bad flooring and inspect the slab there for cracks, but cracks don’t generally start from the middle and work their way out, the overall floor is still level and there are no signs of slab cracking on the house exterior, so we think (hope) that’s unlikely as the root cause.</p>
<p>We never see water pool on the floor, just discolored patches and evidence of water like bits of black mildew on the edges of a few boards. </p>
<p>Yep, smack him is the right advice about the darn installer and even the goofball who sold us the product without selling us proper subfloor or moisture barrier. I’m convinced of that!</p>
<p>Just a thought, but “watering” your house may be the source of your water problem! That water has to go somewhere, and all your doing is adding more water to the soil around and under your house.</p>
<p>Could it be there is just too much moisture in the air and you notice it in your hardwood floor? Get a dehumidifier.</p>
<p>Sometimes our basement gets really “moist” at certain times of the year and the flooring on the rooms above buckle. That’s when I realize I forgot to turn on the dehumidifier.</p>
<p>Sometimes slab floors suffer from buckling when weather goes from extremes of hot and cold. One cure to pick the kind of hardwood that doesn’t react to extreme temperature variations, like bamboo (which is really a grass, not a wood). I think cherry might be good too, but not oak or pine.</p>