wood flooring from Lowes

After the first of the year we are thinking about having some of the Pergo Max from Lowes installed in a living room that is about 280 sqft.

Anything good or bad about this brand or other recommendations around the same price of about $ 2.50 per sq.ft..

This is in a small town so not a lot of choices in the flooring to choose from. I did have some flooringinstalled a few years back by a local flooring company and was ot very impressed with the installers.

On the same thing, what would be a good mat or material to put over the flooring for a computer chair with rollers for wheels. I think after a short while the wheels would cut through the wood.

Reply to
Ralph Mowery
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Just for the record, AFAIK, Pergo is a laminate material where they essentially print an image of wood on a plastic surface. Tt's not real wood, nor does it have a wood top layer, like engineer wood products do. Not saying I wouldn't use it, depending on the application, but it is what it is.

Reply to
trader_4

"Pergo" is the brand name and while they were laminate-only (and I presume it's _probably_ one of those products OP's talking about) for a long time a couple years ago or so (not sure exactly when) they started producing wood flooring as well. So, it's possibly one of those products, too...

To OP, in front of a desk I'd put down one of the desk floor mats over the flooring, whatever it is...

Reply to
dpb

There are no pets, just my wife and I , both around 65 and 70.

What I think I would really like to have is some that does have a small layer of real wood on top. Really would like to have some that I have heard of years ago that was thick enough it could be refinished one time if there were no deep scratches in it, but the people at Lowes did not know anything about this kind of flooring.

This flooring is going in the room with the TV and most used room of the house.

About 5 years ago we had some laminate that was the printed on stuff installed in a dining room and hall and it seems to be holding up ok for the usage it gets. I looked at a piece of it and it seems to be a layer about paper thick on top.

How hard would it be to take out and replace a piece or two after it had been installed if it gets a bad sctatch or something ? They left about half a box of the stuff that was installed in the hall. I don't need to now, but just wondering.

Reply to
Ralph Mowery

You have to consider carefully the mat that you purchase! Many have "t*ts" on the underside to dig into carpet. You'd want one that is smooth, top and bottom.

Personally, I'd go for a small piece of indoor/outdoor (very thin) carpet. A plastic mat will end up sliding. And, scuffing the flooring beneath. Not so with a rubber-backed indoor/outdoor carpet.

You could try a (solid) plastic mat with a "no slip" rubber sheet beneath it. Not sure if they make them large enough for a typical ~4ftx4ft desk chair mat!

Reply to
Don Y

Then whoever you talked to at Lowes doesn't know what they are doing. Lowes, HD, etc all carry that product. It's called engineered wood flooring. And like you say, it can typically be refinished one or more times if need be. Another advantage is that they put the finish on it in a factory environment and I think you get a tougher, better finish than if you finish a conventional wood floor after installation. The engineered substrate is also supposed to perform at least as good or better that solid wood with regard to moisture, etc.

Reply to
trader_4

I had been using the plastic protectors on the carpet and like you said, they just do not last long. The carpet will be comming out after the first of the year if the stock market does not drop out the bottom. and some laminate type of hard wood will be going back in.

If it was not in an area that has to look nice, I would do like I did in the basement that has a room with some indoor/outdoor carpet installed, just put down about a 4x4 foot piece of plywood that I had laying around.

Reply to
Ralph Mowery

IME, you want to mix hard with soft: i.e., a hard/stiff protector over a soft carpet; a soft protector over a hard surface.

I've had a plastic protector over carpet for ~10 years, now. What I've noticed is the chair tends to "make it's own place" in the protector; leaving little divets for each of the casters. This is frustrating when you want to move the chair -- esp if you only want to move it a VERY short distance (it wants to roll back into those divets).

In the long run, it has proven to lead to cracks in particular spots as the stress is always constrained to those locations.

As the OP is looking for something to put *over* a "hard" surface, something "soft" can work -- i.e., a piece of indoor/outdoor carpet. Anything "hard" runs the risk of shifting, over time. Dirt and other crud that works its way under that will grind away the top surface of the flooring.

If he wants to go "upscale", he can laminate some of the flooring to a substrate, put some rubber under it and lay *that* on the floor. Not worth the effort, IMO, but, to each his own.

Reply to
Don Y

Ralph Mowery posted for all of us...

Get casters for the chair that are rated for wood.

Reply to
Tekkie®

Unless one is way over weight all is well. We have several high quality office/commercial type chairs in the house I got almost free when office was refurnished. Does not cause any problem on the floor.

Reply to
Tony Hwang

For the most part, that's correct. We put Pergo in the kitchen (pattern we selected was a faux marble, very light in color generally with grays and tans thrown in). This was long enough ago that it was glued seams. SWMBO loves it. Spills wipe up (IF you can find them) and hides dirt, etc. like a champ. Grandkids and granddogs can't hurt it. Scuff marks from heels wipe off with a DRY paper towel. Damp mop cleans it up like new.

Got tired of the carpeting in the rest of the house and was going to go with either engineered hardwood floors or... something else.

While in the BORG one day, I walked by their flooring displays and spied a type of Pergo made solely for the BORG. The name escapes me now but while it is "printed" it also has some texture to it (about the same you'd see with real wood floors). The color was the exact shade we were looking for and the clincher was that every visible joint is actually a joint. The joints are actually highlighted by a very slight chamfer as you expect on a hardwood floor. The product is just shy of 5" wide and, I think 4' length. Snap lock installation with the foam underlayment pre-attached (Pergo's standard subfloor requirements are in effect and you do NOT use any other underlayment).

Again, it looks great, it looks real, it cleans up easily, the dogs and grandkids can't hurt it and, more recently with SWMBO seriously breaking her ankle requiring surgery, etc. Neither her transport chair, walker or crutches have left any marks.

Best of all, it really looks like wood and guests comment on how nice it looks and can't believe it's a laminate floor. IIRC, I got it on sale and it ran about $2.75 sq ft.

Disclaimer: I don't sell Pergo, I don't have stock in that company nor in Home Depot, but this product is really one of a kind. the other Pergo, not so much.

Reply to
Unquestionably Confused

I, too, wonder about that Ralph. I have a little less than one package squirreled away against that eventuality. What I would/will do is take a small panel circular saw with depth set appropriately and cut the offending section out by cutting about 3/8" from the joints all the way around. Final cuts will be with a sharp chisel or multi-tool so as not to disturb/harm the balance of the floor. Once I get it cleared, I'll remove the bottom of the grooves on the two adjoining edges and slip the replacement piece into place. Likely, it will not look perfect but I suspect that it will be one of those "to see it you have to know it's there and be looking really hard for it."

In this case, I suspect the bigger the piece you're replacing, the better off you are. There's enough flex to the Pergo that if you measure seven times and cut once you can get a nice press fit and everything will lock into place on two edges. If that's not tight enough, a light, thin bead of clear silicone or RTV on the "unsecured" sides, followed by a weight on top until the silicone cures will solve the problem while still allowing for the slight seasonal expansion/contraction of the floor.

Reply to
Unquestionably Confused

I'm shocked! ! !

My family room has Mannington engineered wood that I installed about 15 years ago. Still looks great with the factory aluminum oxide finish. Had I used typical urethane it would not have held up as well.

IMO. laminate is good but it just is not the same as wood. That said, we put WilsonArt laminate on the steps many years ago and it still looks the same as when installed. Probably will outlast me and certainly the carpet it replaced.

Reply to
Ed Pawlowski

"Hard" is the wrong question to ask. :> It's relatively easy to replace! The thing you want to be concerned with is how *noticeable* the repair will be! Most wood products have regular patterns that your eye seizes on. So, even small deviations (crooked line, larger/smaller gap, etc.) are readily noticeable.

Growing up, the walls of the basement and living room were tongue-and-groove paneled (6-8" wide continuous planks, floor to ceiling). Likewise, the acoustic tile ceiling in the basement.

If you have a DEFECTIVE section that you aim to replace, then you can afford to "sacrifice" that/those piece(s). You cut *inside* the perimeter of the affected pieces to isolate it from the carrying surface (wall, floor, ceiling). This ensures the tongues on the remaining pieces remain intact (they are visible between the INSTALLED tiles/planks).

The replacement piece is where the effort is required. As they aren't flexible (over that short of a span), you will have to cut the tongue(s) or groove(s) off to allow the other (groove or tongue) to mate with its neighbors (like parallel parking in a spot that's just as large as the vehicle you're driving! :> )

[paneling has tongue on one edge, groove along the other; ceiling tiles have tongues on TWO edges, grooves on the OTHER two!]

If it is *true* tongue-and-groove -- i.e., one edge looks like [ while the mating edge looks like a T on it's side -- then you have to cheat. But, do so in a way that no one can *see*! :>

[Some schemes are more like "opposing double-rabbets" -- like an L mated with an upside down L. These are easier to fudge!]

On the replacement piece(s), remove the bottom/hidden half of the groove to make it into a rabbet. I.e., turn the [ into an upside down L. Slide the tongue of the replacement piece into the groove of the neighboring piece. Lower the modified groove side of the replacement piece to sit *atop* the protruding tongue of its neighbor.

In this way, you've not altered the visible dimensions of the pieces. The gaps will remain as they were before (assuming the replacement piece is dimensionally identical). There won't be any disturbance in the "pattern" that you perceive, visually.

If you simply chop off the tongue(s) and drop it in place, you'll end up with a different seam on that side. Depending on how tighly packed the pieces, this may prove to be visible (or not).

[E.g., with tongue and groove paneling, the tongue is usually visible in the installed pieces; it forms a continuous visual surface from one plank to the next]
Reply to
Don Y

It depends on the effort you want to expend and the tools you have available. If you take pains to cut the original piece out leaving "a bit of meat" along the edges with the tongues, you can run the piece through a planer (or, just buy some identical thickness shim stock) and insert this into the grooves of the "still installed" adjacent pieces. I.e., make the opening into which your replacement will fit be "all tongues" (or, 3 tongues) and your replacement piece "all rabbets".

A bit of thinking before cutting usually pays off. There are very few "do overs" in this sort of endeavor! :>

Reply to
Don Y

When building 7 years ago (same age range for the 2 of us) we went with a laminate because of having a 60 pound dog. It's in the kitchen and living room/family room. It looks really nice. However, if we didn't have the dog, I would have used real hard wood. It has a 'softer' feel and probably looks a little better. However, I've got to say, this laminate (Shaw) looks pretty good.

Reply to
Art Todesco

I don't understand all the talk about using a saw to cut out sections, etc. Ralph said he has Pergo. Pergo is a floating floor system. It's not nailed or glued down, they just push together. If you need to replace a section, I would think the easiest thing to do is just pull it apart to get to the bad section, replace it, then put it back together. I guess if you had a real big room with the bad spot in the middle it might require a different technique.

Reply to
trader_4

[snip]

Certainly, if the damaged area is near a border, that will work. However the Pergo does NOT just push together. It locks by joining the pieces at an angle (~30 degrees) and then pushing down. The only part that "pushes" together are the end pieces. That said, to "uninstall" the floor to get to a bad piece in the center requires that you remove everything from the baseboard into that position (let's say 8' in) and from one end of the room to the other since it all locks together and the joints are staggered by 16" to 20" or so.

If somebody accidentally dropped a spinning router in the center of my living room, I'd damn sure attempt to cut out the section before taking up the entire floor, numbering everything to reinstall it, etc.

If the "cut and paste" routine that Don and I have offered doesn't work, removal/replacement of the entire floor remains an option. I suspect, trader, if you actually installed a Pergo or similar floor system, you'd agree.

Reply to
Unquestionably Confused

Exactly. Like trying to remove a brick in the middle of a wall by removing the bricks above it (i.e., they overlap each other). The farther "down" you need to move through the courses, the WIDER the gap you have to create (to ensure no bricks lie atop the NEXT LOWER course when you go to remove THOSE bricks -- getting you one step closer to your target).

Please remove the twelfth chevron from the following sequence -- without allowing any of the others to move in the process:

Reply to
Don Y

The flooring I am asking about is the kind that floats and not nailed or glued down. It just sort of snaps together. While I guess that it would be possiable to start at the edge and remove a lot of flooring which may take all day or more for one person, there must be a simple way to remove one board and replacce it with another. I see how getting out one board may not be much of a problem, but getting another board in would be.

There is no patern to match. This floor just looks like a hard wood floor with a random patern. When looking at over $ 1000 a replacement is not really an option for me if only one or two boards get messed up.

Getting the old one out may not be much of a problem, but getting a new piece in is the question. From what I am reading, I guess that I would need to cut out some of the edges which sort of equates to the tounge and grouve in the real hard wood flooring and then glue in the new piece.

Reply to
Ralph Mowery

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