House treated by wood specialists and now unliveable due to the chemical smell

Eldi_Dos

@Joedavis

The reason I asked about the temperature of the room when you go in first thing in the morning is I have found that temperature has a large effect on the voliatility of chemicals and this may be having a bearing on what you are experiencing.

Myself I steer well clear of the chemical sections in garden centres during the hot month's, especially if they have a glass roof as I find it noticeable to come across symptoms similar to you describe, and that is with chemicals in well sealed containers, so I do not think anyone believes this is not a real problem.

Joedavis

The smell hasn’t lessened after several weeks and the house is not liveable. I had the company come back to evaluate and they assured me the smell would go. But they did say the smell would be gone after a day. I feel quite sure that the wood has been over treated and the smell is permanent. I’ve made the decision to replace the floorboards one room at a time. It’s going to be an expensive fix but I’m willing to do this for peace of mind and to have a home that doesn’t make me feel ill. 

Thanks for all comments and advice. 

WIAWSNB

Joedavis said:

The smell hasn’t lessened after several weeks and the house is not liveable. I had the company come back to evaluate and they assured me the smell would go. But they did say the smell would be gone after a day. I feel quite sure that the wood has been over treated and the smell is permanent. I’ve made the decision to replace the floorboards one room at a time. It’s going to be an expensive fix but I’m willing to do this for peace of mind and to have a home that doesn’t make me feel ill. 

Thanks for all comments and advice. 

What a shame you feel you need to do that.

How old is the house? Good chance the boards will be pitch-pine or similar, almost certainly with a more pronounced grain and warmer colour than new whitewood boards. 

Would you still sand and oil the new boards? If so, I fear you may be disappointed with the finish.

If you think about it, if you have the original floor sanded, then 95+% of the treatment will be removed - it only penetrates a mm or so at best. And then you'll have it oiled, which will very effectively and fully seal the timber.

I simply cannot see any odour still coming up that floor. But then, I'm not sure how much more sensitive your nose is than mine.

FreeBear

Joedavis said:

I’ve done some more research and found out that the company used a product called Wykamol Microtech Woodworm Treatment which is labelled as water based, solvent free and “virtually odorless”.

First port of call is the MSDS sheet. From that, we can see it contains the following ingredients -

(CAS-No.) 52645-53-1 Permethrin at 20-40% - The active ingredient.

(CAS-No.) 9003-11-6 2-methyloxirane at 20-40% - Soluble in water, and is (probably) acting as a carrier for the permethrin.

(CAS-No.) 111-76-2 2-Butoxyethanol at 10-20% - A surfactant and a a known respiratory irritant.

(CAS-No.) 55406-53-6 Iodopropynyl butylcarbamate at 1-10% - A preservative that is perfectly safe at (very) low concentrations.

Before use, this woodworm treatment must be diluted with water at a rate of one 150g bottle to 25l of water. That would put the final dilution of the active ingredient(s) at 0.12% to 0.24%. Whilst not acutely toxic to humans, I wouldn't want to be breathing the stuff in whilst it is being sprayed. Pemethrin is generally regarded as safe one dry, but that is for domestic sprays at (typically) 0.05% or less concentrations.

Butoxyethanol will break down within a few days in air, so it would be important to ventilate the property thoroughly. Perhaps using large industrial fans to blow lots of fresh air in from outside.

If you are suffering from respiratory problems, I'd suggest pushing for the firm that did the treatment to stump up fans. I suspect the operatives were a bit too slap happy with diluting the chemicals before use.

Alfrescodave

FreeBear said:

Joedavis said:

I’ve done some more research and found out that the company used a product called Wykamol Microtech Woodworm Treatment which is labelled as water based, solvent free and “virtually odorless”.

First port of call is the MSDS sheet. From that, we can see it contains the following ingredients -

(CAS-No.) 52645-53-1 Permethrin at 20-40% - The active ingredient.

(CAS-No.) 9003-11-6 2-methyloxirane at 20-40% - Soluble in water, and is (probably) acting as a carrier for the permethrin.

(CAS-No.) 111-76-2 2-Butoxyethanol at 10-20% - A surfactant and a a known respiratory irritant.

(CAS-No.) 55406-53-6 Iodopropynyl butylcarbamate at 1-10% - A preservative that is perfectly safe at (very) low concentrations.

Before use, this woodworm treatment must be diluted with water at a rate of one 150g bottle to 25l of water. That would put the final dilution of the active ingredient(s) at 0.12% to 0.24%. Whilst not acutely toxic to humans, I wouldn't want to be breathing the stuff in whilst it is being sprayed. Pemethrin is generally regarded as safe one dry, but that is for domestic sprays at (typically) 0.05% or less concentrations.

Butoxyethanol will break down within a few days in air, so it would be important to ventilate the property thoroughly. Perhaps using large industrial fans to blow lots of fresh air in from outside.

If you are suffering from respiratory problems, I'd suggest pushing for the firm that did the treatment to stump up fans. I suspect the operatives were a bit too slap happy with diluting the chemicals before use.

I'd also be thinking of using some large fans to try and remove any remaining odours.
As for asking the firm to supply the fans, thats not going to happen as that would imply accountability on their part.