Hardwood Floor Solid or Engineered?

[javadog]

Speaking of dogs...

I recently moved to another state and am renting a house for the time being. It's been re-fiitted with some sort of engineered wood floor (it was built in the 80's and originally had mostly carpet.)

I think the floor is crap, as is the installation. But, my point is...

It's like an ice skating rink for the dogs. They have to move really slowly to walk across it, especially around corners. If they lie down, they struggle to get enough traction to stand up again. I've had to buy area rugs and the like, just so they can get around.

[911 Rod]

Originally Posted by Captain Ahab Jr

My living room has real oak floor in a mix of 10", 12" and 14" widths and rustic grade timber so plenty of character

Wanted the 200 year old look, anything narrower or engineered wouldn't have looked right. It's been down for 15yrs suffered a real beating from dogs, kids, furniture and open fire embers but just looks better and better for it

Installed it myself, stored the planks in the room for a couple of months to acclimatize to the room humidity, nailed sheets of high quality plywood to the concrete floor and then glued and nailed the planks. Used traditional rose head nails so the heads are slightly proud. Only treatment was a wipe with a hard wax oil

If I owned a modern North American style home think I'd go with an engineered oak flooring as the style needs to fit in with the general decor

Of all the people here, you are one of the few that could pull this off.

[mattdavis11]

Originally Posted by red-beard

If we were in a conventional house with wood-subflooring, I would have gone with standard hardwood flooring.

My parents conveniently went on vacation when they had their oak floors installed over concrete slab. Vapor barrier, 3/4 inch plywood, oak planks. I watched it all go in place. It was super dusty, but came out spectacular. My dad and I did red oak treads on the stringer for the stair case from rough. Plane to stain and urethane. It all came out gorgeous!

We have wood floors in our home, but it is over layed with engineered. 1950's home, had hardwood, carpeted over, then removed, but it was too much work to refinish in a home that never had climate control until last year.

[mattdavis11]

Only pic I have of the floor and stair case.

[aschen]

no expertise here, but we have installed engineered in our current and previous homes. We have been happy with the results.

I love the traditional thin plank oldschool hardwood floors. Every vendor I visited said that these would be a bad Idea for ground floor on slab install in the Houston region. Seems like most people I know around here are installing wood look tile these days. Too loud and hard for me though.

[onewhippedpuppy]

Originally Posted by javadog

Speaking of dogs...

I recently moved to another state and am renting a house for the time being. It's been re-fiitted with some sort of engineered wood floor (it was built in the 80's and originally had mostly carpet.)

I think the floor is crap, as is the installation. But, my point is...

It's like an ice skating rink for the dogs. They have to move really slowly to walk across it, especially around corners. If they lie down, they struggle to get enough traction to stand up again. I've had to buy area rugs and the like, just so they can get around.

I had laminate floors in a past house, they were slippery as hell. Way worse than wood but that stuff does wear like iron.

[javadog]

Originally Posted by aschen

no expertise here, but we have installed engineered in our current and previous homes. We have been happy with the results.

I love the traditional thin plank oldschool hardwood floors. Every vendor I visited said that these would be a bad Idea for ground floor on slab install in the Houston region. Seems like most people I know around here are installing wood look tile these days. Too loud and hard for me though.

I installed some ceramic tile that was almost indistinguishable from hand hewn wooden flooring in the kitchen of my last house. Not a big fan of that, either.

[1990C4S]

For durability and 'grip' I would go with vinyl plank. I have that in a house I rent. It's not right for my current application, but in the right place it is really good.

[gregpark]

A huge part of my business is Luxury Vinyl Plank. I'm a believer. The new generation click looks and installs so much better than the crap I used to glue down 40 years ago. 100 percent water proof and damn near scratch proof. The better quality is guaranteed for life. I haven't sold laminate for 25 years. It's crap. MDF or particle board core. Ponding water finds it's way into the cracks, swells at the joint and looks like hell in the reflection of the light. Even back in the day I refused to install it on stairs. Some kid in socks is bound to get hurt

[red-beard]

If you do go the Engineered route, stay away from MDF and Particle board. The one we used was basically plywood with a hardwood top.

On concrete you have to level the floors by using a leveling compound. Then you have to use a glue that seals the concrete like a vapor barrier.

In our business, we went with floated laminate floors. Cheap, look good, stand up to traffic. If they had the vinyl stuff when we put the office together, I would have used that. It is even better looking and impervious.

[fred cook]

We used solid wood, a distressed Teak style. It came prefinished so putting it down was pretty easy. We did 3 bedrooms, a hallway, a study and the den. It's been down for about 10 years without any issues.

[group911@aol.co]

This. The more I see of it, the better it looks.

Originally Posted by gregpark

A huge part of my business is Luxury Vinyl Plank. I'm a believer. The new generation click looks and installs so much better than the crap I used to glue down 40 years ago. 100 percent water proof and damn near scratch proof. The better quality is guaranteed for life. I haven't sold laminate for 25 years. It's crap. MDF or particle board core. Ponding water finds it's way into the cracks, swells at the joint and looks like hell in the reflection of the light. Even back in the day I refused to install it on stairs. Some kid in socks is bound to get hurt

[1990C4S]

Originally Posted by red-beard

If you do go the Engineered route, stay away from MDF and Particle board. The one we used was basically plywood with a hardwood top.

On concrete you have to level the floors by using a leveling compound. Then you have to use a glue that seals the concrete like a vapor barrier.

In our business, we went with floated laminate floors. Cheap, look good, stand up to traffic. If they had the vinyl stuff when we put the office together, I would have used that. It is even better looking and impervious.

I had one experience with a 'particle board' based flooring product. Never again. I'm only looking at 'plywood' type construction.

[badcar]

Just purchased 1050 sq/ft of Acacia 3/4 solid hardwood. Delivering next week for install first week of December. I believe this is some of the hardest wood out there....

[1990C4S]

After a good bit of research I am going with solid hardwood floors for several reasons.

- really good, engineered floor is more expensive
- the Chinese products have questionable quality, and it's not always apparent before you install
- getting the same color a year form now is a crapshoot, I bought from a local supplier that's been in business for a long time
- I am not installing on cement, that's where engineered wood is clearly superior

Look for posts in one of the before/after or repair threads of my prefinished ash floors.