Air Waves Under New Vinyl Flooring

geospec

My flooring subcontractor installed a new Stainmaster Soft Step 12.00 on our newly plywood subfloor for a kitchen addition on January of this year in San Francisco. The kitchen cabinets were installed a week later on this vinyl flooring and everything was completed on schedule. A month latter after the completion, the flooring started to develop air waves of 1/2 inch wide by 20 ft long under the vinyl and the air gap is progressing to about 6 inches wide now. We called the Stainmaster's technical service and we provided all the necessary information and hoping for a helping hand to solve this problem. Stainmaster's technical service told us that the dealer gave us the wrong type of glue (Adhesive V-31) for this flooring and told us to get together with the dealer to replace this vinyl flooring. The right glue should have been MT-711. Yesterday, the dealer's technician is scratching his brains to repair this flooring with a flame torches and the air wave reappeared when the vinyl cool off. The technician promised to return next week with a "bigger" heat gun to do a pro job. Do you think this repair approach will work?

naptown CR

no!

geospec

How successful will it be by injecting glue with a syringe under the air waves for such a big area?

Mike Costello

nope wont work.

Needs to be peeled back but if the wrong adhesive was used it will never be right.

Get the store where you got it from to replace it

rusty baker

When you put the other adhesive down and it fails, which it will, someone is going to have a real mess to clean up.

geospec

Hi Mike,

Does peel back means peel out the vinyl flooring and the wrong glue? This will be a costly rework for this 80K kitchen. Not to mention attorney's fees!

George

Mike Costello

Yep, unfortunately.

You should not incur any cost , your floor failed due to installation

Rkeister

Yes, mannington's V-31 adhesive is for their felt backed sheet goods. The cushioned products must use their pressure sensitive MT-711.

Floorwizard

v-31 is the corect adhesive for Stainmaster Vinyl.
I have it right on my samples.

Fact is, this is installer related.....not adhesive

most likely

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Crock

I thought that until I re-read the O/P. The bubble came later and it is 20' long and growing.

What "improper installation" method would cause that severe of a delamination at a later date?

mdshunk

I've seen similar delamination in an area that got heavy wheelchair traffic.

Crock

Your theory is that something heavy rolled across this area before the adhesive set. Thereby causing said vinyl to disconnect from the improper adhesive.

Following your line of thought it would behoove the installer to provide documentation from some source that stipulates using the improper adhesive on this product is indeed an acceptable method of installation or prove that a dolly was used to transport the new cabinets across said floor before the adhesive set.

Given that the O/P stated cabinets were brought in a week later could put a wrench in that defense.

I

Rkeister

V-31 is the correct adhesive for all FELT backed stainmaster products
Stainmaster's cushioned products are the same backing as mannington's sobella line which would require the MT-711 adhesive. Mannington makes all stainmasters vinyl products.

skyhook

Could be a moisture problem in the substrate or below.

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Crock

On a side note. Could I ask why you decided to bring in the vinyl before cabinet installation? We always do it last, so just wondering.

Rkeister

most likely it's the v-31 adhesive. It's not grabbing the product properly. it's a product specifically designed for felt back sheet goods, not cushioned goods. The vinyl backed cushion is too heavy for v-31 to adhere properly, thats why they say to use MT-711

Floordude

Plain and simple...

Wrong adhesive used.

Although, the other adhesive may have worked had they gotten enough out of the bucket and onto the floor.

Can't believe they are going to try and pull back and reuse a full bond vinyl!!

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Floorwizard

WHOA..just caught that.
I am up in Alaska and we have not received the soft goods yet.
I didn't know it was available.
thanks for correcting me.
yes V31 for felt only.

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TimelessQuality

Sounds like a lack of open time before the floor was laid. Does the 20 ft strip follow the path of an appliance dolly?

I vote installer problem...

edit- Oh yeah...wrong adhesive too!

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PrecisionFloors

This.

A felt backed adhesive can work on the 'glass backed stuff, but its pretty tricky to do, and is almost guaranteed to leave bubbles and/or telegraph anything that's under it. It's not really a matter of whether or not it'll stick...it will. It'll just look like crap.

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