Prevent shrinkage and cracks in your wood floor with a humidifier

When humidity is low, a humidifier prevents damage such as shrinkage and cracks to your wood floor. Such a humidifier ensures a continuous supply of moisture, despite dry weather conditions. The lifespan of your wooden floor, parquet floor or laminate floor is thus considerably extended and the quality of your floor is maintained.

Why use a humidifier with a wood, parquet or laminate floor?

Every home has its own indoor climate. The climate in your home depends in part on construction, the degree of ventilation and, of course, weather conditions, among other things. Because of this, the amount of moisture in the air can vary greatly in your home. We cannot influence the weather conditions. Nevertheless, we can take actions to control the amount of moisture in the home.

The amount of moisture in the home has a major impact on wood floors. A wood floor expands or, on the contrary, shrinks with different amounts of moisture in the air. When humidity is high, a wood floor absorbs moisture from the air. At low humidity, wood floors release moisture to the ambient air. Moisture absorption or moisture release changes the properties of wood. In particular, a wood floor such as a parquet floor can suffer significant damage from moisture.

Shrinkage and cracks in your wood floor? Not enough moisture in the air!

Proper moisture control in your home is necessary to maintain the quality of your precious wood floor. Wood floors can be severely damaged by dry air in the home. Relative humidity that is too low can cause cracks and fissures in your wood floor, parquet floor or laminate floor. This is because during dry weather conditions, wooden floorboards shrink. Especially during periods of frost, there is little moisture in the air. We ourselves adversely affect the humidity of the air while heating the house. By using central heating, district heating and wood stoves, we heat our homes very dry. Humidity can even drop to 25 - 30% RH (Relative Humidity) in the winter months.

Measuring humidity prevents damage to wood floors

Keep a close eye on the course of humidity in your home. Humidity is between 50 and 60% RH in ideal conditions for wood floors. At this humidity, wood floors work the least. You can easily track humidity using a moisture meter, also called a hygrometer. On the hygrometer you read the relative humidity in the air. If there is too little moisture in the air, we recommend increasing the amount of moisture in the air by using one or more humidifiers. Humidification prevents dryness damage to wooden floors. A moisture meter will alert you in time to poor conditions for your wood floor.

Cracks in floors often occur in winter

Cold air is unable to absorb much moisture. Therefore, during winter periods, there is usually not much moisture in the air. As already explained, wood floors shrink as a result. This shrinkage can be seen as floor boards creep out from under baseboards and frames. (Large) gaps form between floor and wall. In these dry weather conditions, cracks can also appear in the wooden floor. These cracks are not easily repaired. In addition, large, sharp splinters form around the cracks in the floor. Especially for children, this can be very dangerous. Therefore, keep a close eye on the amount of moisture in the air throughout the year. It's a shame that your wood floor will be damaged by too much or too little moisture in the air.

Would you like to know more about how the HomEvap humidifier can help protect your wood floor? Then check out this page.