Rant: Overheard a guy at the supply house say glue down is dead and it got me thinking

I was picking up some 12mm LVP last Tuesday and this older installer was telling the counter guy that he only does floating floors now, says glue down is a thing of the past. He was talking about a job he did in an old church where the glue failed after two years because the subfloor had too much moisture. I get that floating floors are faster and cheaper, but I've got a condo job coming up where the slab has a few hairline cracks and I feel like glue down gives me more control. That stuff he used was probably a cheap acrylic adhesive from a big box store, not the urethane stuff we get from the pro shop. Has anyone else here run into a similar situation where glue down actually saved your butt on a tricky slab?

3 comments

3 Comments

derek_schmidt624d ago

Told a contractor once that glue down saved a warped slab. @milesj70 would back that.

milesj7024d ago

I used to be all in on floating floors myself, swore by them for speed. Then I had a job on an old basement slab with a bunch of control joints and a little slope. Glue down was the only way I could keep everything locked flat and not have it sound like a drum. That moisture story from the church is real, but you can fix that with a moisture test and the right urethane glue. Floating floors are fine for clean new slabs but they're not the answer for every single floor.

garcia.laura24d ago

Saw a YouTube video from some flooring guy who tested this exact thing. He glued down a section of floating floor over an old slab with cracks, and within a month you could hear the hollow spots where the joints were. The moisture thing is tricky too, even with vapor barriers sometimes the slabs breathe different in different spots. That urethane glue might work but I'd still want to do a proper 72 hour calcium chloride test before trusting it. Heard about a crew that skipped the moisture test once and the glue didn't cure right, turned into a nightmare with cupping later. Think it's smart to match the floor to the job rather than forcing one system all the time.