Have you been thinking about engineered wooden flooring? If you haven’t, then you should. Compared to the other solid flooring types out there, engineered wooden flooring will be more likely to please the most people. However, don’t go buying your engineered wood floors before you check the competition out, as well. Engineered flooring competes primarily with solid wooden floors, as well as laminate wooden flooring.
Comparing Looks
Direct comparisons between solid wood floors and engineered wooden flooring don’t always make sense. After all, the part of engineered wood flooring that you step on is solid wood. Engineered often looks a lot more realistic than laminate, mainly because it is. From the same outlet, and sometimes the same manufacturer, you can often purchase a laminate wood floor which is very obviously fake, and one that actually looks better than either a real or an engineered wood floor, although it still won’t actually be real, but merely a picture. Between solid and engineered wooden flooring, though, it’s tough to say that one looks better than the other, until they begin to show wear.
Sounds
Don’t discount the importance of sound when choosing wooden flooring. For the most part, the floor doesn’t get a lot of attention except as something to step on, but when it makes a disturbing noise, the attention it receives is not really wanted. Although most people don’t even think about it, the easiest way to tell the difference between the three is often by sound. The hollow clunk that is characteristic of laminate wooden floors is a dead giveaway. Many laminate manufacturers swear up and down that this is no longer an issue. A solid wooden floor, though, is quite solid and silent. Well, that is, until it begins to creak. Although professionals do have ways to minimize it, pretty all solid wood floors will face a creak or two, or maybe more, which is an issue that laminate mostly can’t develop. Engineered wooden floors could possibly creak, and might have a slightly hollow sound, but nether will be nearly as pronounced. Creaking in engineered flooring is somewhat rare, but possible. I guess, when comparing engineered wooden flooring to solid wooden floors, you just have to decide if which possibility bothers you most, or which brand you trust to not have these issues.
Durability
When talking about strength and durability, you can’t beat a solid wooden floor. Even when it gets damaged, all you have to do is buff it and refinish it. That’s really all there is to it. Engineered wooden flooring can be buffed, too, but not to the same degree. As the top, solid layer is thin, one can only sand it once or twice, depending on the brand. As with laminate, deep gouges and scuffs might result in you replacing boards to repair. However, laminate can’t be buffed at all.
Price
Pricing of engineered wooden flooring is hard to gauge with any kind of certainty since, as with solid wooden floors, there often seems to be no rhyme or reason to price fluctuations. Being a very natural product, the price will move around a lot depending on availability of certain types of lumber. Because it takes more of this natural product, you’ll notice that solid wooden floors often fluctuate more than engineered, although laminate typically is affected only by demand. All things considered, engineered wooden flooring typically costs a bit more than laminate, but a lot less than most solid wood floors.
Want to learn more about engineered wood flooring? Check out Wooden Flooring Info.
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