Quick Start GuideThere is a wide choice of wood (and wood effect) flooring available. Below we have given some brief information on them. You may also want to look at the Frequently Asked Questions.Solid Wood Floors A solid wood floor is constructed of one piece of wood from the top of the board to the bottom. Solid wood flooring can be bought unfinished (bare timber) or prefinished (factory applied finish, usually lacquer or oil). Most solid floors are fixed down to the existing floor. They can be glued down or nailed down. Solid floors can be sanded and re-sealed if necessary. Our ranges of solid wood floors include: Herga Solid Wood Flooring and Boen Solid Plank Flooring. Engineered Board Floors Engineered floors (often called semi-solid) are the most popular types of wood flooring. Well known brands are Karelia, Boen and Junckers. The floor is normally constructed of three layers and the overall thickness of the flooring is typically 14 or 15mm. The top layer (wear layer) is typically 3 - 4mm thick, the middle layer is about 10 or 11mm and the bottom layer about 2mm. The three layer construction is designed to give the floor more stability compared to a solid wood floor. The stabilitity is attained because the grain in the middle (main) layer of timber runs at 90 degrees to the grain in the top and bottom layers. This cross-ply construction greatly reduces expansion and contraction. Engineered floors can be sanded and re-sealed if necessary, in fact engineered floors can normally be sanded as many times as solid floors. Typical Construction of an engineered board: 
If you have underfloor heating, this type of flooring will be more suitable than solid flooring (in our opinion!). Structured Board Floors Structured boards are typically 20mm thick consisting of 6mm hardwood wear layer and 14mm ply base. They are used as an alternative to solid wood flooring. The advantage they have over solid wood flooring is that they are far more stable. The biggest draw back with solid wood flooring is its susceptability to changes in humidity. This leads to expansion and contraction in the boards, in turn leading to cupping, swelling and gapping. The wear layer of 6mm is similar to the wear layer of a 20mm solid floor since even in a solid floor only the top third of the floor (above the tongue and groove joint) is usable. The structured board does everything a solid board does (apart from move around!) The structured boards are perhaps the most versatile type of flooring available. Boards can be nailed down, stuck down, laid floating or be nailed straight onto existing floor joists. The final advantage that structured boards have over solids is that they are suitable to be laid over underfloor heating systems. Laminate Floors Laminate floors are constructed of an MDF type board. The visible layer is a photograph of a wood plank. The top layer is typically clear PVC. Laminates are very tough, normally tougher than any wooden floor. They are easier to fit than wooden floors and are cheaper. Unfortunately, laminate floors do not normally look as 'real' as a wood floor. With many laminates, the 'same' board (photograph) can appear many times within the floor. However, laminates are improving and the quality of the Quickstep range is superb, making it hard to distinguish between real wood and laminate. Quick-Step Laminate Flooring is available here at flooring sales. |
