Laminate and vinyl plank floor repair

Laminate and luxury vinyl plank are usually floating floors, which means they are not fastened to the subfloor at all. The planks lock to each other and the whole assembly sits loose on an underlay, free to expand and contract as a single sheet. That design avoids the seasonal fastener movement that makes nailed hardwood squeak, but it has its own failure modes. If the expansion space around the perimeter was left too small, or a cabinet, trim nail or transition screw pins the floor down, it has nowhere to go when it expands and it buckles or peaks at a seam. If the subfloor beneath is not flat, the planks bridge a low spot and you get a hollow, clicking sound underfoot where the floor deflects into the void. If a click joint has separated, the planks move against each other and you hear a distinct tick rather than the groan of a nailed floor. Glue-down vinyl is different again: there the usual problem is a bond that has released in one area, often because of moisture from below.

A damaged plank comes out one of two ways, and the choice depends on where it sits. Near a wall, the trim is lifted and the rows are unclicked back to the damaged plank, the plank is swapped, and the rows click back together. Nothing is cut, and one vinyl plank maker calls it the simplest method. In the middle of a large room, unclicking that many rows can damage the locking edges, so the plank is cut out instead. A saw set to the plank’s depth cuts down its length, the pieces are lifted out with a chisel without touching the neighbouring planks, and the replacement goes in with part of its locking profile trimmed so it can drop into place, a bead of glue along the joint, and weight on it while the glue sets (Pergo, Tarkett).

A new plank only holds if the cause under it is fixed. Floating-floor installation guides set the conditions the floor needs: a subfloor flat to within 3/16 inch over 10 feet, an expansion space at every wall, door frame and pipe (1/4 inch in one vinyl plank guide, 3/8 inch in one laminate guide), and nothing fastened through the floor, whether cabinets, trim nails or transition screws. Over concrete, the guides call for moisture testing first, and the laminate guide for a 6-mil polyethylene sheet over the slab. A buckled or hollow run is checked against those before any plank is touched.

The other limit is the plank itself. Keep any spare boxes from the original job. A discontinued pattern, or a new batch in a slightly different shade, can make a single-plank repair stand out. When damage covers most of the room, the pattern cannot be matched, or the subfloor needs flattening under most of the floor, the answer is a new floor. That is a flooring installer’s job, because Squeaky Floor repairs floors and does not install them.