Durability of hardwood/bamboo

Aug 12, 2007 4 Replies

I'm thinking of laying down a bamboo floor in what would be a home office with a rolling desk chair. Are the wheels of the desk chair going to quickly turn the bamboo floor around the desk to crap? Thanks!


Consumer Reports rated different floor types recently. Check it out at the library but my memory says that bamboo will dent just like hardwood.

Bamboo is more stable and harder than many hardwood species but I still use a chair mat for rolling around as the contact points between the chair and floor could be many hundred pounds/square inch. Many of the chairs use cheap hard plastic wheels which could dig into or scratch the flooring. I use a sheet of 1/4" Lexan which is much better than the commercial plastic floor mats.

Good plan...

OP may also want to note that the darker "caramelized" bamboos are significantly softer than the lighter colors for the same basic material.

Bamboo is so many species and preparation is so different from styles and manufacturers there is no general answer. Need to look at ratings for specific flooring products themselves.

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Thanks, everyone.

Upon further review, I've decided that bamboo poses too many practical problems for where I was hoping to put it, so I'm looking at using one of those Tarkett fiber floors instead. I'll still use a floor mat under the chair, and will look for Lexan. Thanks for the tip!

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