1.5 year old house, we are the second owner (1 year) but the first guy never lived in the house. Hardwood floors look nice but lots of pops and crackles when walking on them (kitchen-great room-hallway approx 1200 sq. ft.) I researched this a while back and read some where that this is common for new installation and should go away after a year. A year later and it's still bad. From what I can tell they didn't prepare the subfloor surface properly. From the basement the subfloor is soundly attached to the engineered trusses including liquid nails).

To late to complain to the builder or installer, wondering if anybody has any recommendations on how to eliminate the snap, crackle, pop. So far I think injecting an epoxy or glue of some sort under the hardwood floor may be my only option.

 

Is it solid hardwood or one of the modern thin, click lock flooring systems? If it's the latter I'd pull it all up. Save the pieces and reinstall. The exact method and whether or not you can glue will depend on the exact flooring you have.

 

So as inquired what type of floor, nail down, click lock, glue down, lots of different methods, all have different symptoms.

And, issues dont improve with age!

​​​​​​​And exactly how did you come to this conclusion?

 

Looks like it's a nail down laminate hardwood floor. I came to the conclusion the sub floor was not prepared properly based on what I have been reading on the internet. Lot's of instruction and trouble shooting claims the sub floor has to be prepared properly before the hardwood floor is laid down. This was one of the last houses built in this area and maybe the builder cut some corners.

 

That is engineered wood.

Really the only prep that is done is making sure all the sub flooring is screwed down and checked/corrected for flatness. There is really no way your going to verify if any of that was done at this point.

Now you need to confirm how it's installed, typ engineering floors are floating, not nailed down but you need to look at the underside of the sub floor to see any nails/staples.

 

I see just a few finish nails breaking out from underneath (a few near the electrical wire). Maybe most just didn't break through. I don't see any underlayment near any of the vent openings, so I assume it's nailed.

 

You'd still think they'd use an underlayment, roofing felt is most commonly used under nail down hardwood. The felt both serves as a vapor barrier and gives the flooring enough cushion to prevent squeaks. I think that is the main reason for the noise.

 

I just read something that I didn't think of and I believe it would be my best option to silence the floor. Drive screws from underneath the subfloor into the engineered hardwood, just have to figure out the best screw and the proper length.

 

Typ your noise comes from the wood rubbing against the adjoining piece of wood (due to vertical space) so an underlayment really would not help.

Typ a nail down floor has a LOT more nails than what the picture is showing.

I've never attempted, I doubt you will be able to get the screw exactly where the noise is found. If I have a noisy spot the more common fix is to drive some 1 1/2" finish nails through the flooring into the sub floor and fill the hole with a color wax.

 

The snap-crackle-pop noises pretty much happen over the total hardwood floor space. I figure I would at least do the high traffic areas. So I'm thinking many screws. I would hate to scar up the top side. I will try a few screws from underneath and see if it works.