Engineered Flooring or Solid HW?

[James "Cubby" Culbertson]

Sorry for the somewhat offtopic post (still has to do with wood though :) ).

Anyway, considering putting down wood flooring in a few rooms at mi casa. Substrate is concrete and there is really no motivation to add a 1 1/2" subfloor as that will cause uneveness to other flooring already installed. I see there are really two alternatives for me (well more but these are the two I'm considering). Engineered flooring or Solid flooring.

The engineered flooring can either be installed with glue down or in a floating configuration, comes with a roughly 25-30 year warranty, and has a 2mm thick top veneer. The solid is 3/8" or 1/2" (depending on species) and is glued down (warranty is up to 50 depending on manuf.). Any recommendations? I worry a bit about a 2mm veneer (5/64") being too thin yet the engineered flooring is also cheaper. The solid wood would be fine but as expected, is more expensive.

Anyone with some experience in this decision? Advice? Thanks very much,

jlc

[Edwin Pawlowski]

My Mannington engineered wood has been down for about 18 months. Over concrete it was by far the best solution for me. It is a floating floor and seems to have excellent wear capabilities. I'd not be concerned about hte

2mm tip thickness.

[muttongeoff]

I decided to go for engineered flooring in my last house, very easy to put down. It was a 3.6 mm veneer and wasn't any cheaper than solid wood but I thought it was likely to be more stable over concrete. I reckon

2mm would be fine if you don't intend to do too much agressive refinishing.

How flat are your concrete floors? In the lounge I had to rescreed the floor to get it flat as there were dips of up to 1.5 inches!!!, I hadn't noticed the dips when it was carpet but a wooden floor is going to be a bit bouncy if it is not supported. Something to bear in mind.

Geoff

[Leon]

I put down engineered maple in our master bath about 4 years ago. It floats on top of a 1/8" closed foam padding layer with that on top of a 4 mil vapor barrier. So far so good.

[M-14]

I have an Engineered Floating Maple floor (destroyed by flood) and next door has a Glued down 3/8 Solid Oak.... When the glue separates from the sub or from the wood it makes noise.... so they have 3 spots that you can tell something happened underneath.

As long as you don't drop anything real heavy with sharp edges, the Engineered Floor will hang in there. ( the oak would get screwed too) but that was the only problem I had when I dropped a piece of granite and it made a dig not through the veneer, but I'm afraid to patch it because I'm unsure of the clear coating and it's small enough to ignore.

My whole lower floor was Engineered The Kitchen was destroyed in the flood. So we're thinking of Bamboo through out the lower floors with or without a Ceramic tile in the Kitchen??? Still going back and forth! But the Engineered floor as much as a pain as it is, is also easy to change and also take with you. So in 10 years you get tired of it, out down something different with MUCH less work. What I'm doing is taking the good flooring downstairs and redoing the carpeted hallway and bedrooms!!!

[Pat Barber]

Engineered are much more stable... Most have a plywood substrate and the finish is tough as nails.

**** Beware of slab floors that are NOT flat *****

Wood floors do NOT like uneven surfaces.

James "Cubby" Culberts> Sorry for the somewhat offtopic post (still has to do with wood though > :) ). >

[Wayne Whitney]

I have heard of using a 3/4" floating subfloor over concrete by laminating two layers of 3/8" plywood. Has anyone tried this?

Cheers, Wayne

[M-14]