What is the difference between solid and engineered flooring?
Solid and engineered flooring are two very different types of wood floors. It is important to know the benefits of each type of flooring because, in certain situations, one may be preferred over the other.
The appeal of solid hardwood planks can often be found in their thickness. At 3/4-inch thick, solid flooring allows homeowners to strip, sand, and restain the planks on a semi-regular basis, while retaining its functionality for many years.
Solid hardwood floors will expand and contract with relative humidity changes in your home. Installers compensate for this movement by leaving an expansion gap between the floor and the wall, typically hidden by baseboard molding or quarter round. As a result, solid hardwood is not recommended for areas of the home with high moisture content, such as the bath and basement.
Installation of solid hardwood floors requires that the boards be nailed or stapled down. Nailing involves driving a nail at an angle on the tougue side of the board with the staple of nail entering at the top inner corner at the tougue proceeding through the full thickness of the board through the subfloor at an angle.
Engineered flooring is produced using five to nine layers of hardwood, with each layer stacked in a cross-grain configuration and bonded together using heat and pressure. As a result, engineered flooring often has a lower price point and is less likely to be affected by changes in humidity, allowing it to be installed in all levels of the home, including the basement.
Engineered hardwood flooring can be installed in a variety of ways. In addition to nailing and stapling, it can be glued down. For engineered flooring that is 3 inches or wider, the floating installation method can also be used. Whereas gluing involves troweling glue on the floor and setting the engineered planks into the glue, the floating installation method requires foam underlay designed specifically for floating floors, as well as a special adhesive to glue the tongue and groove of the boards together.
What is the difference between unfinished and prefinished flooring?
Unfinished hardwood strips or planks have not been stained or sealed at the factory. As a result, all the sanding, staining and finishing must be done on the job site. You can select your own finish and stain so you can customize your flooring but additional job site work is needed over prefinished flooring.
Prefinished flooring is stained and sealed by the manufacturer. The polyurethane coating on a factory-finished floor provides a stronger, and generally more durable surface.
What is the Janka Rating System?
The Janka Rating System has become the hardwood flooring industry’s standard for determining whether a particular wood species is suitable for flooring. Standardized in 1927 by the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM), the Janka Rating System indicates a wood’s relative hardness.
Testing is conducted by measuring the force required to embed a .444-inch steel ball to half its diameter into a wood sample, a reliable method for assessing the ability of a wood species to withstand denting and wear. Higher ratings are assigned to harder woods, which tend to be more durable than softer woods.
Janka Hardness Chart