All,

Just bought a new house a few weeks ago, and laminate floor is making popping sounds in many areas when I walk on it.  It feels like the piece of laminate goes down when my foot-pressure hits it.  I presume this is because there were  flaws in the gluing process.  

I called the installer and he claims it's b/c of uneveness in the concrete floor.  He then goes on to give rather ... um... smoke-y excuses.   (as in "smoke up your.....")

The most obvious solution to me would be to remove and reglue the panels.  The installer intends to drill ostensibly tiny holes in the wood, pour glue in, and then seal and refinish the ostensibly tiny holes.  My worry about this is that it could make the floor look like Swiss cheese if not done properly.  

Anyway, to get to the point. what would the best way - ideally - to fix the floor?  Remove and reglue?  Drill the holes?  Some other way?

Thanks in advance,

KoAT

eta: made it a bit more clear that it was laminate

Is it a wood floor or a laminate?



Laminate is supposed to float.



If the concrete floor is screwed it will be noisy.



if the installers failed to properly clean before laying it, it will be noisy.

The installer needs to come out and replace the entire floor on his own dime. If the floor is laminate then there is no glue required because it is a floating floor. What the installer didn't do was "float' the floor with Ardex or some other leveling compound.

The installer is right, but that doesnt mean he is going to come out to fix it.  You have some unevenness in the floor for it to make that sound.  There should also be a foam pad between the laminate and the concrete, so you will feel alittle give if you are more than petite. Eventually the popping noise will lead to the locking edge of the pieces breaking off near the uneven part.  If you were to screw it down then all the pieces around that would pop off also. About the only solution is to pull it up and level the floor then relay the flooring.......be prepared to buy new flooring as some if not most of it will be damaged in the pull up.

Are there small gaps between some of the pieces? If so its possible that they didnt get the pieces locked together right and sometimes that will cause popping also.

Thanks all for the responses.  Keep 'em coming.......

Yes, there are gaps between the pieces.  Some are consistent - generally at the shorter end of a piece.  A few are at the long end.  Most are long enough to stick your fingernail through.  One of them is even wide enough that you can see a bit of the concrete underneath.

He is right about how to fix it. They did not level your floor before they laid down the laminate and if you see concrete and there is no moisture bearier between the floor and the laminate that is not good, unless they have some new laminate that I am not aware of. To install over concrete the floor should be checked for level and if not leveling compound should be used to level out the floor. Then a moisture bearier is put down and then the floor. Sounds like steps one and two were skipped when they put yours down. If it is a new house and you are still dealing with the contractor try to get him to fix it if not you will eventualy have too.  

This sounds like they were not locked together, but the cracks could be the result of the unlevel floor.  Without seeing it I cant tell you if any of it is ruined or not, but it really needs the foam barrier laid over the concrete.  When it is done correct there are no gaps at all.

EDIT I just reread the installers cure.........WTF dont let him do this.  If he is willing to come out make him pull the stuff up and get someone else to put the floor down the second time.... This dipshit either doesnt know a damn thing or was just feeding you what you wanted to hear ie. glue bla bla bla.  Either way he is not to be trusted again.

Thanks dudes.  I'm of course not putting up with this BS and am insisting to them that they do it right this time.  

KoAT