GS Flooring

GS Flooring supplies and installs carpet, tile, hardwood and laminate in St. George. Almost every home in this valley is built on a concrete slab, and the slab is the part of a flooring job that decides whether the finished floor succeeds - which is why a good installer tests it before quoting an adhesive.

How it works

Concrete is not dry when it looks dry. Curing consumes some of the mixing water chemically, but a great deal remains in the pore structure and leaves slowly by evaporation from the surface, a process that takes months rather than weeks and continues after the house is occupied. A slab poured on grade also sits on soil, and unless a vapor retarder was installed beneath it, ground moisture keeps migrating upward indefinitely. Adhesives and moisture-sensitive floor coverings fail when that vapor arrives underneath them, showing up as bubbling, edge curling, adhesive that has re-emulsified, or a laminate that has cupped.

That is why the industry tests rather than guesses. The standard methods put a relative humidity probe into a hole drilled in the slab, or measure the rate of moisture vapor emission at the surface, and the result is compared against what the specific flooring and adhesive allow. When the reading is too high, the answer is a moisture mitigation coating applied to the slab, or a floating floor that is not glued down at all. Many post-tension slabs in the area add a second consideration: the tensioning cables run through them, so anything that involves drilling or fastening into the slab needs the cable layout established first.

See also concrete contractors and home inspectors. The directory lists all Flooring.

Nearby: Tint Studio, Appliance Solutions of Utah, Canyon Kitchen & Bath.