We are about to redo our floors with Kempas, but I have recently heard that it may not be a very stable. Can anyone who knows anything about Kempas tell me what you know? Thanks a lot.

It is a mover but not a shaker.

Good response! Does that mean that it is hard, but not very stable? If so, can you recomend a wood that looks like Kempas but is more stable? Thanks a lot.

I was going to wait a bit longer to post my observations, but since you're asking...

We installed 3/4" solid pre-finished Kempas in September. I too was afraid of all of this stability talk I was hearing. I live near DC, and the summers are pretty humid, and the winters are fairly dry. I thought that I might see massive gaps and cracks in the winter. When I installed, the indoor humidity was a pretty consistent 50%. We run AC a fair amount of the time in the summer, but when it's nice, it's open windows for us.

We don't have a humidifier (although we're seriously considering it), so the humidity is down to around 30% now for the last month or so. Not sure if it goes much lower than that, I've only had a gauge since the summer.

From what I can see, the contraction is similar to what I observed when we had a section of the floor covered in solid red oak. Almost all of the floor shows no gaps at all, but there are a few boards where there are noticable, but not objectionable, gaps - maybe about the thickness of a putty/spackle tool. The same thing would happen to our oak floor - small gaps open in winter, and then close back up in the summer months.

So far, we've been very happy with the quality and the look of our floors. All our friends have been impressed with how the floors turned out. It's not the same ol' oak or maple floors you see in a lot of houses.

One concession I did make to stability - chose a 3 5/8" wide plank rather than a 4 3/4" plank that was about the same price. I've heard too many stories about wide planks that scared me off something that wide.

Hope that helps.

Just so you know.........I've heard from a few suppliers that they've had some structural problems with Kempas in the prairies where things get very dry. It seems that when it gets too dry it actually starts to crumble. FYI

Thanks again for all the info. Phil, you situation sounds very similar to mine, so your recomendation makes me feel better about it, thanks.

We are having major issues with the Hartco solid Kempas 3 1/2". It will not lay straight. There are gaps of at least 1/32 & getting worse. This is our 2nd batch of wood & 2nd set of installers trying to get it installed. @ flooring reps have been out & 1 admitted yesterday that there is a milling issue with the floor. No word on how they plan to resolve it. Meantime I have boxes of flooring & 1 room partially done. Kempas is gorgeous but this has really made me rethink my decision to use it & Hartco. Humidity is not the issue since the wood has been aclimated & we have humidity year round but run the heat & air so it really doesn't change.

Hartco & Robbins, is basically the same junk as Bruce wood flooring. All owned and made by Armstrong.

Yea, Hartco and Robbins USED to be separate companies and made some pretty good floors. They still do if you select the right ones. But back about a decade or so ago ( I really don't remember exactly when this happened ), a corporation called Triangle Pacific went around and bought some other flooring companies. I guess they made them offers the stock holders couldn't refuse. They bought Robbins, Bruce, Hartco and a few smaller brands I can't remember and don't see around anymore. A few years later, Armstrong came along and bought those lines from Triangle Pacific. Now it seems, some of the product line has merged as well. For example. Bruce made "Natural Reflections" and Hartco made "Kingsford Strip". They were different with Kingsford being a sliced veneered engineered floor 3/8" thick whereas Natural Reflections was/is a 5/16" solid. Now go and look for Kingsford Strip and you'll find it in Hartco's line BUT it is now a 5/16" solid; exactly like Natural Reflections. So it's the same floor with a different label. Armstrong is doing this with other lines in the Hartco, Bruce, Robbins line up as well. The colors are getting to be the same too. I'm thinking some of the product is made in the same factory but packaged differently. How this effects quality I'm not sure. Robbins engineered USED to be a three ply 1/2" with a thicker wear layer and they prided themselves on this. It no longer exists. I guess it was all bound to happen sooner or later. Just wondering when Tarkett will sell their wood brand to Armstrong as well.

So what are the right ones? I was looking at using Hartco Valenza Collection Sakura, engineered & solid. I have called many suppliers of the Hartco Valenza Collection with 0 complaints with no returns, in fact a lot of compliments regarding the quality of it. It bewilders me how a certain product can have opposite experiences