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Just bought a new place with white oak hardwood and radiant heating.

The hardwood is 3/4" (verified). Floor has developed gaps in certain areas. One area in particular is loose when I walk on it, so the gap is more pronounced. Looks like the gap had been puttied in the past and now the putty is coming out.

You can see gaps and putty coming out in the photo below. The floor board moves up and down slightly if I step on either side of the gap.

What's the best way to fix address this?

p.s. I'm not sure what kind of radiant heating installation I have either. It was done in 2009 on a new construction in SF if at all helpful.

enter image description here

edit: here is one part that's exposed in the closet, wood is 3/4" thick enter image description here

Dan F
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    That's not so much a symptom of radiant heating as low indoor humidity. Any idea what yours is at? What's your outdoor temperature? – isherwood Nov 05 '19 at 21:39
  • Outside is has been 70s+ lately and a bit hotter recently. Inside humidity is 38% per nest. Could the fact that the wood moves around the gap is making matters worst? It move down enough in some places that my toes scrape the wood across the gap. Trying to see if there is a way to fix that as well. – Dan F Nov 05 '19 at 21:45
  • That's fairly low humidity for such warm weather. Whether movement is an issue depends on the type of floor. You said that you though it was 3/4", which would be solid nail-down. You should probably find out for sure. – isherwood Nov 05 '19 at 21:46
  • I verified it's 3/4" by measuring wood in an area that's exposed in closet. Added photo of that area too in case helps. – Dan F Nov 05 '19 at 21:53
  • Have you been able to determine what kind of radiant heat you have? I'm guessing electric or I would suspect the gap between subfloor and floor would be significantly bigger. Do you know if the heat is actually cycling on/off at all and on/off at proper T-Stat setting? – brehma Nov 05 '19 at 23:25
  • It's a boiler system, with water tubes. The heater turns on and off ok. I was told by the heating contractor that the temperature of the water at boiler was set at 186 degrees, which is way too high. Probably been like that for 10 years. He turned it down to 120 degrees now. – Dan F Nov 06 '19 at 00:55
  • Do you have access to the floor from underneath (basement/crawlspace)? If so, to eliminate the movement you may be able to drive screws thru the subfloor and into the hardwood. But you will need to ensure the screw length less than the thickness of the subfloor plus 3/4" so you don't accidentally screw thru the hardwood surface. I would use a flat washer as well to ensure the screw doesn't countersink. – peinal Nov 06 '19 at 01:25
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    @peinal - Your suggestion needs to be considered rather risky. Any screws driven through the sub floor like you suggest runs a good chance of damaging the radiant heat system under the oak floor. From a comment it looks like that heat system is a bunch of hot water tubes in the flooring. – Michael Karas Nov 06 '19 at 02:08
  • I agree it is quite risky, but if carefully measured it may be doable. In any case I don't think the OP is loaded with good options. The risk could be mitigated by setting depth on a drill bit to subfloor depth, drilling a small hole and confirming no piping would be pierced. Pulling up flooring is an option, but certainly not a good one--unless there was sufficient leftovers from the original install (to mitigate color mismatch risk of buying additional flooring). I would be tempted to turn off the radiant heat for a few weeks and see if the floor expanded and tightened up. – peinal Nov 06 '19 at 02:23
  • There is a bedroom below the living room which has the hardwood. So unfortunately no way crawlspace or access below the hardwood. Could it be screwed from the hardwood down and screw holes covered? And pipes detected via infrared? Or any other options? – Dan F Nov 06 '19 at 02:56
  • p.s. Unfortunately the hardwood manufacturer has stopped making the product, and there aren't any leftovers. – Dan F Nov 06 '19 at 02:59
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    That makes anything that could be done risky. Your suggestion is certainly a possibility, but may not give the results you hope for. The good news is 3/4" hardwood can be torn out, re-installed and sanded to give good results. I have removed 40 yr old hardwood from old church demo, re-installed it, sanded and had good results. One issue here is if channels were routed out of the hardwood to make room for the heat tubes, you may not have as much surface to sand as with a 'normal' re-install. Do you know if it was glued during install? – peinal Nov 06 '19 at 03:28
  • I unfortunately don't know how it was installed. I just bought the place recently. They would either be glued or nailed down? – Dan F Nov 06 '19 at 03:49
  • I am certain they were nailed down. I also use liquid nails when I install to avoid squeaks. Too bad you don't have photos made during the install. – peinal Nov 06 '19 at 17:07
  • Perhaps you could call a mold remediation company in, or anyone with an IR detection system, to try and trace the radiant pipe locations. They might even be able to tell if the pipe is closer to the surface or not to address @peinal point. If that's possible, you should be able to make some better decisions. – brehma Nov 06 '19 at 18:27

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