Engineered Wood Floors Explained



Posted: Thursday, September 22, 2011

by Steve Hill
Stuttering therapy

People often get the wrong idea about engineered wood floors. It’s not real; they say…it’s the same as laminate flooring...it’s the cheaper option. Well – they couldn’t be further from the truth.

The thing about engineered wood flooring is that the actual engineered wood product is 100% wood. Unlike laminate flooring that is a multi-layer synthetic flooring product fused together with a lamination process.

No – Engineered wood flooring is produced by having 3-12 numerous ply layers that are cross-layered, glued and pressed together. The inner core layers are usually built up with either a hardwood and/or soft plywood type of material that integrates with the tongue and groove system. The top piece of thicker hardwood veneer wear layer is then glued and pressed on the top surface of the core. Engineered hardwood flooring is obtainable in almost any wood species and because it uses only a thin wear veneer, engineered wood flooring helps protect expensive prized wood. For every 1 sq foot of 3/4 inch thick solid wood flooring manufactured you can manufacturer approx 4 times that amount into engineered wood flooring. Engineered wood flooring is the best flooring to provide people with to conserve our forests.

The benefits of using engineered wood floors include more resistance to higher moisture levels than solid wood flooring, which adds to their appeal to use in damp basements or in regions of the country that have higher relative humidity levels.

Also, engineered flooring can be directly glued-down over concrete slabs above or below grade or stapled down over a wood sub floor. If you ever decide to sell your home you can rest assured, estate agents figures show that a quality engineered wood flooring has the same resale value as 3/4 inch solid wood flooring.

Engineered wood floors range in widths from 3-7 inches wide and in thickness from 3/8 - 3/4" What's more is that they come in a wide variety of domestic and exotic hardwood species and a few are even obtainable in the popular hand scraped styles. The most important part of engineered wood floor is the wear layer or the actual piece of wood that you can see. Some of the cheaper types of engineered flooring have a thin 0.6 mm wear layer that can only be re-coated and cannot be sanded and refinished new again once they get worn. They have a usual natural life of around 20-30 years subject to traffic and conditions. Other brands or styles can have a thicker 2 - 6 mm thick wear layer that can be completely sanded and refinished 1- 5 times if they ever needed to be. These thicker wear layer engineered floors can last from 40 - 100 years before having to be replaced and that adds hugely to their appeal.

If you would like further information about Engineered Wood Floors

please feel free to visit our website at http://www.wood4floors.co.uk
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