That's a good question, how was she misinformed? From what she told me, she went to the flooring showroom (beautiful, high end flooring) and they gave her a choice of t&g and non t&g. They did not give her much more information than that, she didn't know any better, and she ordered the non t&g.

Once she got the wood delivered, her own floor mechanic, who she was going to use, said that he could not work with that wood, so he bowed out of the installation. She tried to take it back, and the flooring showroom would not take it back. She went to her GC, and his floor mechanic said he could install it, and he would t&g each piece, again, which he didn't, because she saw it, and the GC knows it wasn't done. Everyone knows it wasn't done.

I have also learned that there should be several thin grooves on the back of the flooring. I don't know if those were on the pieces.

So, that's why I know it wasn't t&g'd. Glued, screwed, and plugged, I don't know. I can check for it being plugged if I look closely, but I don't have too much faith in it being glued. From what I am learning, the subfloor has to be near perfect.

If your client witnessed for herself that the T&G was being omitted by the floor mechanic why didn't she say something then? And if she did witness part of the installation she should have seen how at least one or two boards were being installed......did she see any nail guns, or tubs of glue, or tubes of glue, etc?

If the floor is so tight and perfect, I find it hard to believe that none of the installation techniques already stated here were not used.

The tongue on any solid T&G material is there to facilitate "blind nailing"; it's not there to interlock and hold the pieces together like laminate flooring or any flooring that that is to be floated for that matter. The groove's purpose is to provide a place for the tongue to go.

Those relief grooves on the bottom do allow some air movement under the flooring, but not having them does not mean the floor is headed for failure. There main purpose is to ease the installation process on an uneven subfloor.

This flooring showroom, I take, wasn't strictly a "wood" flooring showroom. I say this because any flooring distributor I've ever dealt with sells mainly T&G material, and for them to even offer a non-T&G material these days is very strange.

Again, find out for certain from your installer (or general in this case) how the floor was installed.

BTW Is this a site finished floor or a pre-finished one?

I can't answer that...I don't know why she didn't say anything, no idea at what point she saw it or was told, or what.

I'm trying not to get her involved at this point. I'm trying to find out information on my end before I decide what to do with the information I find out. I don't want to alarm her unnecessarily. I may go and observe if there is any face nailing, and if there isn't, that could be a further concern. Then, the question might be, were the boards nailed in or screwed? And, does that matter?

I've also emailed the contractor and am waiting for an answer from him.

My fear is that the boards were nailed in, which I assume would not be a good thing. Otherwise, why would flooring be made with t&gs?

T&Gs are for blind-nailing. If there were no tongues the nail or staple would stick out slightly and not allow the floor to fit tightly together.The extra wood material that are the tongues allow the nail/staple to hold the flooring down when blind-nailed (nailed at an angle from the side) and still allow the flooring to butt up tight against each other. The T&G also allows the flooring to be nailed/stapled from just one side of the board while still sucessfully holding down the other side.

Non-T&G flooring CAN be properly installed by face nailling, or gluing, or screwing or a combination of these things.

If the floor is a site finished floor, and was finished correctly you may barely be able to see were it was nailed/plugged.
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From what I read from you, if the flooring is not face nailed and the nails were counter sunk into boards on an angle, allowing the boards to fit tightly together, is that an acceptable method of installation? And, again, if so, I'd imagine this method would be much more widely done, but I could find nothing on it when I research floor installations. I'll have to see if it was face nailed, or hear what the contractor tells me once he hears from the floor mechanic.

If you get the dimensions of this "flooring", I'll tell you how it should have been installed. I'll need width (you said 4"), length, and especially thickness. Also tell me if the wood is veneered (like plywood) or if it is solid lumber. Tell the the species of wood it is (oak, maple, cherry, jatoba, hickory, etc.) and who the manufacturer is (if you can). It SOUNDS as if your client was either sold raw lumber in a SAS4 grade OR 5/16" plank. Both could provide a suitable floor IF installed properly. At this point, you are simply asking if this type of wood can be installed properly and we are saying yes, it can. But you don't have any specifics and are simply guessing. That is not the way to handle a situation like this. You must find out the facts. What kind of flooring, specifically, is it and how, specifically, was it installed? Until you can credibly answer these questions, everyone's responses are purely conjecture.

At this point I would say scr*w emailing and pick up the phone and call the GC in order to get ahold of the flooring guy.

I do some sub work, and I get investors, builders, 3rd partys calling me at all hours of the day to let them know what happenend ect. I ALWAYS get back to them the same day, being my direct boss or not.

When was the last time you were out at said jobsite? Is there any vents? If so you could look inside them to see if any tounge and grooving was goinin g on, or any glueing.

I'm giving this poster a break... I think it is admirable to look out for ones client. No installer on here is going to charge extra for doing something and then not do it. I just don't believe that for a minute.

Could be the installer decided to do it a different way (like glue) and figured that the cost difference would all equal out... that I don't know. But that should have been explained to his/her client, or, not charged them the "extra".


I'm pretty much a novice at this trade so I defer to the old geezer's on here for how it's supposed to be done.

Hey, I resemble that comment!

did anyone happen to notice if he was using a flooring nailer when he installed.

It is possible to use a flooring nailer/stapler even when there is no tongue to nail through. I am not sure how much holding power the fasteners will have but they will sink and they will grab some material. This technique while probably not advised could produce a tight install (atleast initially) since the power nailer would be driving the boards together while nailing them. If he used enough fasteners I could actually see the floor holding up too. I have blind nailed header boards that had the tongues ripped off them to avoid topnailing and have had good success.