Wood Flooring glue not sticking. Any solutions?

Question

We installed engineered wood planking on a hot dry day. The glue apparently crusted over in one area and is not bonding the flooring to the concrete slab subfloor. You can feel a slight "give" when you walk over this area and then you feel a tackiness as the floor boards lift when you step off of them.

I cannot purchase additional boards, as these were bought on closeout. Any ideas?

the area in question seems to be about 18" x 18"

The vendor told me to glue directly to the slab.

This is Southern California - not that we have "hillbillies" here, but perhaps it's an OK thing to do in a dry climate.

At any rate, I will need to ask the vendor about this later today.

Answer 1

I just had floors put down on concrete, similar. We put heavy weights on top of the boards to press them down, that forces the glue to spread under the boards, seep into the poors of the wood and cement, and then let stand for 48 hours. We used engineered too. This works great. Hope you bought the best glue for this purpose.

But first, the floor and wood were temperature matched at 72 Degrees for 3 days.

And as for the first answer, that person is wrong! In the south, they glue directly to the slab in all new construction with Hardwood.

Answer 2

The first poster is absolutely 100% wrong. Engineered wood floors are regularly glued to concrete. In fact, engineered wood floors are the only type of wood flooring that should be installed directly over concrete. And without a barrier is just fine too. Also, they don't expand/contract like hardwood floors do due to the nature of the plywood that the veneer is attached to.
The only problem with the installation as far as I can tell is that the section in question was placed on skinned over glue. That is the reason it didn't adhere.
The suggestion above mine (glue injection through a small hole) sounds like a workable solution, though I've never used it before. Hardwood repair kits are available in many colors at any wood flooring distributor or big box home improvement facility. Follow the directions and you should end up with a repair that only you know is there.

Answer 3

Every manufacturer of engineered wood flooring gives recomendations for gluing directly to concrete subfloors, so don't let the first answer get you down. There is a fairly easy solution to your problem. If you are in southern california, look in the yellow pages for a place called BIG D or Desoto Supply. There you can get a kit for doing such a repair. Basically what you do is drill a small (1/16" or smaller) hole in the center of the area and inject a solution that will spread out and harden as it dries filling in the air pocket under the floor. Then just fill the hole with a dab of wood filler

Answer 4

Interior flooring I presume? Who told you to glue the flooring to the slab? You never do that. In a slab situation, what you do (if installing the floor with no sleeper boards) is lay down a plastic/vinyl vapor barrier on the slab and lay a FLOATING floor on top of it. You never glue the planks to the floor. I don't know who told you to do that but it is totally wrong. You never ever glue flooring to a concrete slab whether inside or out. The floor needs to be able expand and contract and this is allowed by having the floor float. Now that you've done it though, there are two things you can do...... either drive a couple of croncrete screws/nails in the area where the floor is popping up and fill the holes in with wood filler, stain, and then shellac or polyurethane. Or, if you have a few extra planks, cut the problem areas out and glue new planks down. Of course, if it's tongue and groove type flooring, you'll need to cut the tongues off on the new planks you're installing in order to make them fit. NOTE: I just read that other guy's answer about how it's done in the south. I don't care what some idiot hillbillies down south are doing. I REPEAT: YOU NEVER EVER GLUE WOOD FLOORING DIRECTLY TO A SLAB..... EVER. NEVER EVER. AM I MAKING MYSELF CLEAR?

Answer 5

Maybe try a hairdryer and see if that loosens it enough that you could carefully scrape it off. Other than that, sanding is probably the only way. It really depends on the type of glue - elmer's would be a lot easier to remove than say super glue.

Answer 6

It sounds that the glue needs to set. did you let the glue air first so it is just getting tacky then lay the boards?

Answer 7

if you heat the area with indirect electric heat then add weight problem solved.