Reading flooring specifications: what to pull from Parts 1, 2 and 3

Where flooring lives in the project manual is covered in bid packages and addenda. This lesson is what to read once you've found the section.

What does each part of a spec section cover?

Part 1: where the hidden costs sit

• Submittals — product data, samples, seaming diagrams for sheet goods or broadloom, maintenance data and warranties. Each costs office time; physical samples cost money. More in submittals and substitutions.
• Quality assurance — installer certification by the manufacturer, years of experience, a required mockup. A mockup is real labor and material; price it.
• Extra materials (sometimes “maintenance material submittals”) — the attic stock you must hand over, usually as a percentage of installed quantity or a number of cartons per product. It belongs on its own line, not inside waste.
• Field conditions — required temperature and humidity before, during and after installation, and acclimation periods. If the building won't have permanent HVAC running when you install, that's a schedule and cost risk to qualify.
• Warranty — the manufacturer's warranty is usually automatic; an installer's workmanship warranty of more than one year is a cost you're carrying.

Part 2: products, equals and substitutions

• Basis of design — the product the designer based the spec on. Other manufacturers may be listed as acceptable if they meet the basis-of-design criteria.
• “Or approved equal” — you may propose another product, but approval isn't guaranteed. Price the specified product unless you've been told otherwise.
• Proprietary or sole-source specs — one product, no substitutions. You lose the ability to shop material pricing, so get your distributor quote early.
• Accessories and adhesives — specified adhesives, primers, transition strips and edge trims are easy to miss and add up.

Part 3: testing, preparation and installation

Part 3 is where flooring bids lose money. Read it line by line:

• Moisture testing — commonly relative-humidity testing per ASTM F2170 or calcium chloride testing per ASTM F1869, plus pH testing. Who performs and pays for the tests, and what happens when results exceed the limit, is what you need to know.
• Acceptable limits — the maximum moisture and pH readings usually come from the flooring or adhesive manufacturer. Above them, mitigation is required — find out whose scope that is.
• Preparation and flatness — required flatness tolerance, patching, grinding, crack treatment and self-leveling underlayment. If the spec makes you responsible for bringing any slab into tolerance, that's unlimited scope without a stated assumption.
• Installation — installation method, pattern (quarter-turn, ashlar, herringbone) and seam placement, which drive waste and labor.
• Protection and cleaning — protecting finished floors from other trades until turnover, and final cleaning or finish application.

How to turn these risks into qualifications and exclusions is covered in Module 7; how to quantify the prep work is in floor prep and moisture takeoff.