Hardwood flooring is a popular choice for homes and offices, thanks to its natural beauty, versatility, durability, and easy maintenance. If you choose hardwood flooring for your home or office floor, you are making an investment that will last for decades and continue to flaunt a beautiful, spotless, and trouble-free appearance. However, here it is important to know that humidity can seriously impact the aesthetics and functionality of your wood floor. When a beautiful hardwood floor shows defects, it is most likely due to the changes in wood moisture in the boards.
The golden rule for maintaining wood floors is to keep humidity levels in check, ensuring they do not drop below 40% or exceed 60%. Let’s find how too much or too less moisture affects the hardwood floors and how you can keep a control over humidity to maintain the natural beauty and attraction of your flooring.
How High & Low Humidity Affects Wood Floors
A slight increase in humidity beyond the safe limit could cause moisture to seep into the wood. Moisture in the floor boards could damage the floor and cause the planks to swell, warp, crown, or cup. When looking for tips to maintaining hardwood flooring, it is important to understand how humidity affects the appearance and durability of the entire wood flooring structure.
- Often caused by moisture imbalance in the wood – wet at the bottom and dry at the top – cupping is a common problem during high humidity levels. The first thing you might want to do is to eliminate the moisture source, which may be a plumbing or dishwasher leak, or excess moisture in the basement. You might want to recoat or sand the floor if moisture has caused it to cup. However, sanding isn’t the right option if moisture-meter readings don’t indicate a completely dried-up floor.
- Also caused by moisture imbalance, crowning results from excessive moisture on top of the floor from an overhead sprinkler system leak. Crowning often occurs after cupping, especially if sanding is done at a wrong time. Most homeowners choose to sand their hardwood flooring even before the moisture returns to normal, and the board flattens on its own.
- One of the extreme reactions to moisture, buckling is a condition in which the wood planks lift several inches off the sub floor under intense moisture conditions. Though this isn’t a common occurrence, a floor may buckle if it remains flooded for a long time. Caught early, buckling can be prevented by spot repair and replacement, after the floor has dried well and achieved a more stable moisture level.
Any drop in humidity beyond 35-40% can cause the wood to dry out, weaken, and ultimately splinter and “check,” that is, splitting along the grain. Any such changes can severely impact the floor finish.
How To Prevent Humidity From Impacting Hardwood Floors
In order to keep humidity levels within safe limits for your hardwood flooring, it will help to first check the level using a hydrometer or humidisat and then make adjustments accordingly.
- Turn your dehumidifier or air-conditioning system on if the level exceeds the limit.
- Try a humidifier to raise the humidity level if it has dropped beyond the safe range.
By keeping humidity levels in check, you will be able to prolong the life of your hardwood floors, while ensuring it remains in shape to perform its best. Installing wood floors is a big investment, so properly maintaining hardwood flooring would help you keep it in its original shape for years to come.