I bought a lot of Home Legend bamboo flooring for my house on slab and the new guest house being built on post and pier on my land. Problem is, I live in the rainiest area in The Big Island, Hawaii (most rain in the US.) I opened the packages to acclimate them and guess what happened? Mold and mildew all over the sides and back, though not the front. I called Home Depot and after talking to Home Legend, they said they cannot take it back. So I'm now stuck with it. I still like the bamboo flooring and am doing a lot of research to find a way to prevent the mold and mildew from coming back and to safely install it, both on the concrete slab and on plywood in the new guest house. I am asking the experts for advises. Right now I'm thinking of doing the following: 1. Clean the bamboo with bleach to remove mold and mildew. Let dry completely (when it's not raining.) 2. Paint the sides of the bamboo floorings with water-based clear Varathane (a type of polyurethane from Home Depot) to seal it and to prevent mold. 3. On the guest house, lay felt paper on the plywood floor, taping them together with clear tape (not overlapping them.) 4. Float the bamboo floorings on the felt paper. The reason for floating is that the bamboo will expand greatly here, much more than other hard wood, and even the 5/8 inch for expansion recommended by Home Legend may not be enough in our weather. If I nail it, it MAY warp and buckle. 5. Sand lightly and paint the whole floor with Varathane to seal the joints. 6. On the slab house where half is covered with linoleum and half with carpeting, I will take out the carpet and put in a cheap linoleum to complete the moisture barrier and FLOAT the bamboo flooring on top of the linoleum. After that paint on Varathane like on the other floor to seal the joints. Please let me know your thoughts on this. I'm looking for the best solution for this particular problem and am totally open to new ideas. Thanks in advance.

I just bought some bamboo flooring and I am going to nail it down as opposed to glue. Lifting up my carpet I realize the subfloor runs the same direction as I want to lay down my wood floor. So I realize that I am going to have to install a plywood subfloor over the existing floor. Now I have read that I need a gap between the plywood sheets. What should the space between the sheet be and is there anything less expensive than plywood that I could use. I also bought the 3 in 1 moisture barrier. Do I put that under the plywood or on top of the plywood?? This is confusing.:wall: