Best type of hardwood floor to go with?

Question

Looking at putting hardwood floor in part (900 sq ft, +/-) of the house I'm purchasing, and was wondering what everyones opinions were on the different types. Full wood, engineered, laminent? Nailed, glued, floating?

To be honest, I'm liking the floating hardwood.....mainly for the ease of installation as I will be doing that myself. I like the pre-finished as well for the same reasons, but I have never finished a floor so I don't know for sure how hard it is.

Like I said, don't know alot about flooring products, just wanting opinions/experiences on pros and cons.

Thanks!

Answer 1

Go with a real wood floor that has to be nailed.  I've installed a snap together laminate floor, and I don't like the quality.  The lenghts snap together well, but the ends have to be tapped together.  Tapping at one end of the room pushes the boards at the other end together until the joints start to fail.  This looks bad after just a short period of time, and I only lightly tapped as per manufacturer instructions.  On a snap together, each joint has to be sealed individually by hand.  This involves placing a bead of sealant (comes in a tube just like caulking) down and wiping it back off.  Wiping the sealant off requires a lot of "elbow grease".  Unlike the prefinished laminate flooring, real wood can be sanded down, re-stained, and re-sealed over time.  You get what you pay for, and I believe that it is definitely worth the extra to use real wood.

Answer 2

My best advice is ebony hardwood for interior and burmese teak for exterior. For hardwood (natural hardwood) it uses tongeu in groove with glue at the joints for laminate they have a system of "kronoloc". Get advice from floor depot for installation. However you need to treat your floor accordingly.

Answer 3

I don't know about the floating type, I've never used it but I have heard good things.  

As far as prefinished, I put prefinished nailed hardwood floors in two bedrooms in my house 7-8 years ago and they still look like new.  Granted, not high traffic areas but they are the best looking floors in the house.  

Nailing in the floor is hard work, took me a whole week of vacation to do it, but the floating floors were fairly new at the time so I didn't want to risk it.

Answer 4

It depends on how long you plan to be there. If you plan to live there a while I would but down real wood and nail it down. You can buy it pre-finished if you would like but for me that it is the only way to go. But if you plan to be there a short while then go with something cheaper and less work but your resale value is going to be better with hardwood floors.

Answer 5

I have installed each of these products for years and in the case of glueless laminate and floating hardwood, ever since their invention.

By far the easiest and fastest installation is that of a quality laminate. The joints are no longer glued together as in the past, they simply lock. Cheap laminate is often compromised during installation and is a giant frustration. Laminate is not the best option though for beauty and endurance.

The best quality floor that a non-professional can install is a prefinished, solid wood, 3/4", nail down hardwood. The factory finish contains aliminum oxide making it extremely hard and very durable without detracting from the appearance of the floor. This hardener though will likely be more difficult to sand away in the case of future refinishing. If you choose a nail down floor, you will need to rent a hardwood flooring nailer to do a good job.

Engineered hardwood can not be refinished but it is required in areas below ground level.

Floating hardwood has improved greatly in the last year or two but it is still subject to a lot of movement and board seperation.

There are a lot of things to say about each of these floors. If you have any detailed questions or installation instructions, feel free to email.