Solid Hardwood Flooring - Would it Be an Ideal Choice?

Solid hardwood floors - one of the most sought after features of any home. Hardwood flooring adds elegance to your home and if it is laminate flooring, a new feel and fresh touch will be there. However, the main concern of a wooden floor is its age. After few years, you'd need to renovate or refinish the hardwood flooring. Before buying hardwood floor, you should consider for which part of your home you're buying the wood. If you're buying hardwood for damp areas such as bathroom and kitchen, solid hardwood would not be an ideal choice as it cannot accompany your home for a longer period of time because of the moisture.

Even then, if you want hardwood flooring in your bathroom or kitchen go for engineered wood flooring which is processed by interior professionals. In engineered hardwood, the top surface of plywood is covered by finished hardwood. There is a range of varieties available in engineered hardwoods. You can choose from 2 ply to 10 ply construction as per your requirements and budget. You must enticed by laminate flooring because of its variety in color, style and pattern that suits the interiors of your home in best possible way. However, laminate floors are not real hardwoods and their quality cannot match with the class of engineered wood and hardwood. Laminate flooring cannot tolerate moisture like engineered wood. Moreover, it is a fake wood therefore, you cannot sand it.

Solid hardwood floorings are classified into three categories: parquet, plank and strip. If you're looking for designer floor and a patterned solid hardwood, you should buy parquet. You will see a geometric pattern in the individual squares of parquet wood. In strip wood there is no pattern. The simple wood is available in various sizes; the width will vary between 1.5 and 2.75 inches and will be between 5/16" and 3/4" thick. If you find not enough wide for your hardwood flooring plan, you can try plank which is quite wider than strip hardwood and thickness could be anywhere between 3 inches to 8 inches.

Once you've selected what kind of solid hardwood flooring will be ideal for your home and installed it. Now you should know how to maintain it so that you don't need to spend again on the hardwood flooring in next few years. The solid hardwoods are very easy to clean. Keep your floor free from grit and dirt as they can make your floor full of dents and scratches. If you want long lasting flooring; clean it regularly. Does it mean that you should clean the laminate flooring everyday with water? First you should check if the floor is quite old and has got scratches and seems to be getting dull everyday, don't use water at all. In case, finishing is good and there are no dents and scratches, mop it with water which will add a new shine to it. To keep the hardwood flooring free from dirt, you should keep floor mats in the doorways. It will keep you flooring clean and home healthy.

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A Look at Solid Hardwood Floors

Solid hardwood floors should neither be installed over a concrete slab nor below ground level because of high moisture sensitivity. Unsightly gaps appear when moisture dries and the floors contract in the winter heating months. The floors expand and gaps disappear during summers. The wood planks may buckle or cup because of excessive moisture. In view of these facts, enough space should be left for expansion and wood should be acclimated. Nail-down installations are most appropriate for these floors. The possibility of re-coating and refinishing increases the life and appearance of solid hardwood floors. Generally solid hardwood floors are made up of ash, maple, red oak and white oak.

Solid wood floorings are divided into three sub categories: strip flooring, plank flooring and parquet flooring. Thickness of strip flooring varies between 5/16 inch and ¾ inch. Available widths are 1 ½ inch, 2 inch and 2 ¼ inch. Though plank flooring is sold in two thicknesses, width can range between 3 inches and 8 inches. Parquet flooring has geometrical patterns that are created with wood slats.

Hand-scraped hardwood floors are hand crafted. Character markings on handscraped hardwood floors (hand sculptured floors) are a unique feature. These floors offer the best finishes for either the modern world look or the old reclaimed wood floor look. Both engineered and solid hand sculpted floors are sold. Beautiful handscraped hardwood floors are very expensive. Engineered handscraped hardwood floors are best suited for a structure erected on a concrete slab and in high humidity conditions. A few companies also market distressed hardwood flooring that has machine made markings unlike hand made markings in handscraped hardwood floor. Handscraped floor is costlier than distressed version, but both floorings offer a rich look.

Hardwood floors should be cleaned with products recommended by the manufacturer. Regular use of a vacuum cleaner will clean dirt, mud, grit and small stones that may spoil the finish. Welcome mats at the entrance for wiping feet before walking on the floor are of great help in protecting the finish. When choosing furniture for you home, do not buy products with sharp metal or wooden legs to prevent denting and scratching. Use of furniture coasters or felt protectors for all legs will prevent scratching. Non-staining and wide rubber cups are a must for heavy items like piano. The use of a paste wax on the hardwood floor with a polyurethane finish damages the finish. Spills on hardwood floors need immediate attention. Clean them with a paper towel or damp white cloth and dry the area.

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Solid Hardwood Flooring vs Engineered

Solid Hardwood Floors

Appearance, historical: Solid hardwood floors have been used for centuries, and they never seem to loose their charm and warmth. There are solid wood floors that are several centuries old and are still in good condition today.

Construction: Solid wood floors are one solid piece of wood that come in either prefinished or unfinished styles. Solid is milled from a single 3/4" thick piece of hardwood: 3/4" thick plank that is in narrow 2 1/4" strips. This is the classic strip wood floor but the solid wood floors can be manufactured in a variety of widths and thicknesses. The most popular hardwood species used for solid wood floors are red oak, white oak, ash and maple.

Refinishing: Because of its thickness, a solid hardwood floor can be sanded and refinished over several generations of use. You can refinish, or recoat solid wood floors several times, which adds to their appeal and to their long life.

Moisture, humidity: One of the properties of solid wood flooring is that it expands and contracts with changes in your home's relative humidity. Normally, installers compensate for this movement by leaving an expansion gap between the floor and the wall. Base molding or quarter round is traditionally used to hide the extra space. The other very important characteristic of solid wood floors is that they react to the presence of moisture. In the winter heating months, moisture leaves the wood causing the floor to contract which leaves unsightly gaps between each plank. In the summer months when the humidity is higher the wood will expand and the gaps will disappear. If there is too much moisture it may cause the wood planks to cup, or buckle. This is why it is important when installing a solid strip floor to leave the proper expansion area around the perimeter and to acclimate the wood prior to installation. Solid wood floors are sensitive to moisture and it is not recommended to install these floors below ground level, or directly over a concrete slab. These floors are for nail-down installations only.

Engineered Hardwood Floors

Prefinished engineered wood floors have become extremely popular and offer many advantages over solid wood floors. These floors are very durable, come in a wide variety of styles and hardwood species, and can be used in almost any room in the home. Engineered hardwood floors are constructed from several thin sheets of wood that are laminated together to form one plank.

Engineered floors are actually produced with three to five layers of hardwood. Each layer is stacked in a cross-grain configuration and bonded together under heat and pressure. These floors will range from 1/4" to 9/16" in thickness, and from 2 1/4" to 7" in width. The lengths will generally be random and range from 12" v 60" in length.

In the manufacturing of engineered hardwood floors the wood plies are stacked on top of each other in the opposite directions. By having plies reversed they help counteract the natural tendency of wood to expand and contract with different levels of humidity and moisture. Engineered wood planks are much more dimensionally stable than solid wood and can be used over wooden subfloors or concrete slabs.

If moisture is a concern, then you should consider an engineered wood floor versus a solid wood floor. The finish layer of an engineered wood floor can be a different wood specie then the plies underneath because this allows manufacturers of engineered wood floors to offer a wide variety of both domestic and exotic hardwood species without driving the costs out of sight. You can use these floors in almost any area in the home because of its dimensional stability. Most engineered floors can be nailed-down, stapled-down, glued-down or floated over many different types of subfloors. As a result, engineered wood flooring is less likely to be affected by changes in humidity and can be installed at all levels of the home.

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